A “SEXUAL predator” who assaulted a 16-year-old girl in a park after following her as she was walking home has been jailed for 14 years.

Jonathan Swift, 34, from Newport grabbed and groped his victim in Caerphilly on the evening of Easter Sunday after he’d been drinking.

He exposed himself to her and tried to get her to go home with him before he took her phone from her and put his Snapchat details into it.

The defendant pleaded guilty to assault by penetration and sexual assault on April 9.

Swift, prosecutor Ffion Tomos said, was a convicted paedophile and sex offender with two serious convictions already to his name.

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The defendant was jailed for 10 years in July 2014 for having sex with a 13-year-old girl in an alley after meeting her on a bus.

Swift was found guilty of engaging in sexual activity with a child in the Malpas area of Newport but cleared of rape following a trial.

In December 2010 he was jailed for 30 weeks for sexually assaulting a 16-year-old girl when he lured her into a subway after she missed her bus at Newport bus station.

During his sentence at Cardiff Crown Court for the current offences, the victim’s personal statement was read.

She said: “It has completely ruined my independence and confidence.

“I’m in constant fear it could happen again.

“I'm happy that the man who did this to me is in prison. I think that's where he should stay.

“He’s a dangerous man and I don’t want him to do this to anyone else.”

David Rees, representing Swift, said: “He is genuinely sorry for his actions. He does express genuine remorse.

“The only mitigation is his guilty pleas.”

The defendant had been “outed as a sex offender” in the community where he had been living in Caerphilly and had faced “reprisals”, his lawyer said.

Judge Lucy Crowther told Swift: “Your victim was 16 years old. She was walking home on her own when you saw her.

“You went out of your way to approach her, initially by asking her if she had a lighter.

“She was a complete stranger to you. You asked her how old she was. She was only 16. You told her that she looked older.

“You decided to follow her. You continued to talk to her, asking her if she was single. You told her you were 22."

Judge Crowther added: “You have left your victim traumatised. She has lost all sense of independence and confidence that she had.

“She has lost trust in people. She is frightened of every stranger.

“From everything I have read and heard about you, you are a sexual predator and you pose a significant risk of serious harm to the public, specifically teenage girls and young women, of committing further specified offences against them.

“In other words, you are, in my judgement as of today, a dangerous offender.”

The defendant was jailed for eight years plus an extended licence term of six years.

Swift, of Nantgarw Road, Caerphilly, will have to register as a sex offender for life.