A NELSON man has been jailed for three-and-a-half years for grooming a 12-year-old girl over the internet.

Michael Lockwood, 23, swapped sex stories in chat rooms and text-messages with the under-age girl before booking hotels in Banbury, Oxfordshire, and Guildford, Surrey, where they met.

Judge Michael Addison, sentencing at Guildford Crown Court, reminded Lockwood how he had met the 12-year-old girl on the internet and quickly steered conversations on to a sexual agenda.

He said: "In a very short time the communication became sexually explicit. Equally on both sides you detailed sexual matters swapping your views on these matters.

"You asked her for naked pictures and she sent them to you. She said she was in love with you and you said you loved her.

"By this time you knew she was just 12."

In December 2005, when he was 21 and she was 13, they arranged to meet and he booked a hotel room in Banbury where the pair kissed and cuddled but there was no sexual contact.

A month later, Lockwood of Swaine Street, Nelson, travelled more than 250 miles to meet the schoolgirl in a Guildford hotel where sexual activities took place.

The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told school friends about the relationship and Lockwood was eventually arrested in July 2006.

He pleaded guilty to the offences of meeting a child following sexual grooming, causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and two counts of sexual activity with a child.

Anthony Brigden, defending, told the court of his client's remorse and how he was truly ashamed of himself.

Mr Brigden said: "It is not one of the bad cases and in each hotel room it seems pretty obvious that he could have taken matters further."

Further to the three-and-a-half-year jail term Mr Lockwood will be subjected to a sexual prevention order stopping him from associating with or befriending children, accessing child related sites and contacting the victim.

He will be put on the sex offenders' register for life.