A PREDATORY paedophile used Facebook to groom a schoolgirl for sex in his hotel room with offers to shower her with gifts and “treat her like a princess”.

Shaun Johnston, 30, was almost twice the age of the child when he plied with alcohol and tried to get her to take what he thought was laughing gas.

The former soldier was today starting a jail sentence of almost nine years after a judge told him: “You knew what you were arranging to do was illegal.”

Teesside Crown Court heard how after sex Johnston took pictures of her semi-naked “in a sexual pose” and told her they “could make lots of money”.

He set up an account on an adult dating site for the girl and tried to talk her into sleeping with other men, prosecutor Christine Egerton told the court.

The pervert then turned his attention to one of her school friends who he believed to be 15, but was actually 16, and wanted to sex with them both.

Judge Simon Phillips, QC, said he wanted to “compromise” the second girl so she would not report to the police what her friend had been doing.

Later, after the teenagers had a video phone conversation when one was at The Blue Bell Hotel in Acklam, Middlesbrough, the authorities were notified.

He was arrested in his boxer shorts at the hotel, and initially told police he thought the girl was 16. She was in bed when officers arrived.

Johnston, 30, of Toronto Crescent, Middlesbrough, pleaded guilty to nine charges including sexual activity with a child, taking indecent pictures of a child, inciting child exploitation, inciting a child to be involved with sexual activity and attempting to facilitate the commitment of a child sex offence.

Jailing him for eight years and nine months, Judge Phillips told him: “You knew what you wanted and made the arrangements, and set out to achieve sexual gratification without delay.

“You had it in mind to create a situation whereby this child would become intoxicated and you supplied her with copious quantities of vodka and cola.

“You had a canister of nitrous oxide and offered it to her. She refused. You were attempting, in effect, to make this girl not only drunk, but potentially insensible.

“Not only had you exploited her for your own sexual gratification, you were suggesting that she became involved in pornography. It appears that your exploitation was moving at a pace and in a direction that indicates you had no regard whatsoever for her welfare. “

Yvonne Taylor, mitigating, said Johnston, who served with the Royal Dragoon Guards for six years based in Germany, was “remorseful and regretted his actions”.

“He bitterly, bitterly regrets his conduct and behaviour over that period of time with respect to (both girls),” she said.

“He wasn’t thinking and it has been the biggest mistake of his life. He accepts it’s more than a mistake because of the upset and distress caused to the victim.”