June 2009 Pervert met 12-year-old in internet chatroom A COMPUTER student who used the internet to groom, meet and sexually abuse a 12-year-old girl, has been jailed for a year.  Nathan Alan McDowell, 20, first started chatting to the girl after logging into the “teenageavenue” chatroom from a computer at the University of Ulster in October.  The chatroom was created for teenagers aged between 13 and 19 so the girl pretended to be 14 instead of her true age, 12 years old.  Prosecuting lawyer David McClean said the pair then started chatting on MSN instant messanger where they exchanged phone numbers and so began texting each other. Their chatting culminated in a meeting on October 7 last year when the girl asked a pal how to get to McDowell’s home at Downshire Park South in Belfast before playing truant to go and meet him.  Mr McClean said when they met, McDowell “pushed her against a wall” and kissed her before walking her to his home.  There he stripped them both and asked her, several times, to perform a sex act on him.  At one stage, said the lawyer, McDowell asked her “if she wanted to have sex” and when she said yes, took out a condom and started rubbing himself against her.  The offences came to light when the 12-year-old told a friend what had happened. The friend told her own mother who told the girl’s mother who called the police.  McDowell admitted to police that there had been “physical activity” between them and also that he knew she was under the age of consent.  He later pleaded guilty to a charge of meeting a child following sexual grooming, three counts of indecent assault and one of committing an act of gross indecency with a child.  Judge Peter Gibson QC sentenced McDowell to one year in jail, three years on probation and ordered he remain on the sex offenders register for an indefinite period.  McDowell’s defence lawyer queried why there was no supervision over teenage chatrooms.