A TEENAGER who abused a younger girl and told her to “shut up” when she pleaded with him to stop was yesterday locked up for eight years.

Teesside Crown Court heard how Daniel Salter carried out a series of attacks on the girl over four years, which included a rape and an attempted rape.

When his victim was old enough to understand what was happening, she begged her abuser to stop, said Rupert Doswell, prosecuting.

“She objected and cried, and screamed she would tell if he didn’t stop,” Mr Doswell told the court. “He shouted at her that she was stupid.

“She did not tell her mother at the time because she did not think she would be believed and was too scared.”

Salter, from Ormesby, Middlesbrough, was told by a judge: “You were more sexually aware and sophisticated than her, and you took advantage of that.”

He was ordered to stay on the sex offenders’ register for life and was banned from having unsupervised contact with girls aged under 16.

Salter, now 19, denied a total of 15 sex charges, but was convicted of every one by a jury after a trial last month which lasted eight days.

The victim was required to relive her ordeal in public by giving evidence, and the court heard yesterday that Salter still maintains he is innocent.

Judge Les Spittle told him: “Your protestations that none of this took place and it was either lies or mistakes were not accepted by the jury.

“You still do not accept any responsibility – that’s a matter of concern and makes it very difficult for anybody to work with you to deal with the underlying problems.”

Paul Cleasby, for Salter, said: “One has to hope, in custody, he tries to rehabilitate himself. It is early days for people to work with him.

“This will be his first custodial sentence. It is likely to have a significant effect on him. He is not someone from a background of offending.”

Salter, of Farmbank Road, Ormesby, was found guilty of rape, attempted rape, sexual activity with a child, inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and sexual assault.

Detective Constable Ged Swash, of the child abuse investigation unit, said: “The sentence passed today reflects the seriousness of the offences committed by this man, and their impact on his victim.”