A SECURITY guard has been jailed for posing online as the female boss of a modelling agency to get schoolgirls to send him naked pictures of themselves.

Michael Rodham was on bail for downloading child pornography when he pretended to be Sharon Jones to lure the youngsters.

The 56-year-old former steelworker promised exciting modelling careers for the girls – two friends from Tyneside – and £500 to spend on clothes.

Teesside Crown Court heard how Rodham contacted one of the teenagers on a social networking site and claimed to have access to a photographic studio.

His requests for pictures became more graphic until the father of one of the girls complained to police and Rodham was traced to his Stockton home last summer.

Months earlier, he had been bailed after being charged with possessing indecent images of children.

Rodham admitted having an unhealthy interest in children as young as ten and said he had been searching the internet for pictures and storing them for years.

Duncan McReddie, in mitigation, said he would be better treated in the community than behind bars and urged the judge to suspend any prison sentence.

He told Recorder Tahir Khan: “While there is widespread public alarm about offences of this type and, indeed, on occasions, that alarm spills over into unpleasantness and violence, there is also a public interest in reform and rehabilitation of the offender.”

Mr Recorder Khan jailed Rodham for three-and-a-half years, banned him from working with children for life and put him on the sex offenders’ register indefinitely.

An order was also imposed to restrict his computer use and ban him from unsupervised contact with under-16s.

The judge told him his deliberate deceit of the girls was “a gross breach of trust” and said: “A substantial sentence of imprisonment is justified.”

Rodham, of Newton Walk, Stockton, admitted making and possessing indecent images of children, possessing extreme pornography and possessing prohibited images.

He also admitted three charges of inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and possessing more indecent images after his first arrest in January last year.