An asylum seeker who raped a 13-year-old girl after pretending to be a teenager on Snapchat has been jailed.

Abdul Khan attacked the girl in a nature reserve in Clifton, Nottingham, on 14 May last year.

Khan arrived in the UK in the back of a lorry in 2015, Nottingham Crown Court heard, and faces automatic deportation to Afghanistan after he has served two thirds of his sentence.

He was jailed for nine and a half years on Monday after he was convicted of two counts of rape, one count of sexual activity with a child, sexual communication with a child, meeting a child following grooming and perverting the course of justice.

A four-day trial was told Khan, who is believed to be 28 and already serving a 23-month sentence for sexual communication with a different child in Derbyshire, arranged to meet his victim in woodland after telling her on the Snapchat messaging app he was a 14-year-old boy.

When they met in person and it was clear he was not 14, he tried to appease her by claiming to be 16, the court heard.

After activity that jurors found had been consensual, Khan, of HMP Nottingham, twice raped the girl.

Judge Mark Watson said the victim told her father what had happened and he contacted police.

Khan was then linked to the rapes by a mobile phone seized during his arrest over his contact with the child in Derbyshire.

Yet despite DNA evidence subsequently linking him to the attack, Nottinghamshire Police said he continued to deny having met the victim.

Addressing Khan, the judge said: “You deliberately concealed your true identity. She thought she was communicating with a child of her own age.

“It was a lie you have persisted with throughout these proceedings.”

Prosecutor Dawn Pritchard read out a victim personal statement telling the judge the victim “feels numb when she thinks back to how she felt at the time”.

Summarising the statement, Pritchard added: “She felt scared of the world after it happened and felt overwhelmed.

“When she has flashbacks, she sees his face and what happened. She feels like she can’t trust anyone.”

Defence barrister Andrew Wesley said he was unable to offer any personal mitigation on behalf of Khan, as he still disputed the identity and age under which he was prosecuted.

The judge, describing the defendant’s claims over his age and identity as “nonsensical” and bound to fail, added: “The police were called by her father, he learning from her that she had been raped.

“She has on any view been profoundly affected, as her parents must also have been.

“Your sentence will mean automatic deportation.”

The defendant, who covered his face with his hands as he walked out of the dock, was also ordered to register as a sex offender indefinitely.

Det Con Madeleine Johnson, from Nottinghamshire Police, said: “Khan is an opportunistic and predatory offender who poses a clear risk to teenage girls and other young women.

“As his previous grooming conviction demonstrates, he was absolutely determined in his ambition to strike up sexual relationships with young girls.

“The victim in this case was particularly vulnerable at the time of this offence and has unsurprisingly suffered a great deal as a result of what Khan did to her.”

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