A “dangerous” paedophile who had worked as a police informer spying on environmental and animal rights activists has been jailed for life.
Nick Gratwick had been found guilty of 38 offences, including arranging to rape children as young as six in the UK and abroad.
On Friday, Judge Harden-Frost, jailing him, described his offending as “utterly depraved and manipulative, and the stuff of nightmares”.
The 68-year-old from Mitcham, south London, had exchanged hundreds of encrypted messages with other abusers.
He had arranged to pay a Romanian mother to allow him to rape her 10-year-old daughter, discussed harming children for sexual pleasure, and advised others on how to drug and abuse children, between 2023 and 2025.
He had been caught with more than 1,300 photographs and videos of children being abused.
The judge said he would not be able to apply for parole for 19 years, adding he was a “dangerous” paedophile who had not admitted his guilt.
His trial revealed how he had been a police informer in the 1990s and 2000s, spying on environmental and animal rights groups.
For six years, Gratwick had pretended to be an activist but surreptitiously slipped information about campaigners to police.
One of the protests he infiltrated was the high-profile campaign to prevent the destruction of thousands of trees in an ancient landscape to pave the way for the construction of a nine-mile bypass around Newbury, Berkshire.
The protests in the 1990s had entailed many activists setting up 30 camps along the planned route, erecting treehouses, digging a tunnel and climbing trees to disrupt the construction of the road.
Activists have told the Guardian that Gratwick had been a key part of organising the protests. This, it appears, enabled him to gather information about the campaigners to pass on to police.
He helped supervise the acquisition and distribution of equipment, such as rope and harnesses.
The radio engineer also helped to set up a network of CB radios so that activists camped at different points along the planned route could warn each other about likely moves by the police. He was nicknamed “Radio Nick”.
Police have previously disclosed that, in an apparently unprecedented move, they paid a private security firm to infiltrate the Newbury campaigners. They believed that this was necessary as the cost of policing the protest was escalating.
It is understood that in turn the private security firm hired Gratwick to spy on the protesters. Thames Valley police, which policed the protests, declined to comment.
Gratwick also infiltrated animal rights groups, including the campaign to shut a laboratory run by a commercial firm, Huntingdon Life Sciences.
After he was arrested last March on suspicion of the paedophile charges, Gratwick, whose full name is Edward Nicholas Gratwick, had hinted at his previous covert role during interviews with the National Crime Agency.
His work as an informer was subsequently confirmed at his six-week trial at Guildford crown court in Surrey.
Court papers disclosed that “records show that during the eight-year period between 1995 and 2003, [Gratwick] provided information to police for a total period of approximately six years. He provided information on animal rights and environmental matters.”
Kathryn Hirst, defending Gratwick, said that in the past he had “proved very useful to investigating authorities”, without specifying how.
He had been arrested at Stansted airport as he was about to fly to Bucharest to rape the 10-year-old girl.
The jury dismissed his claim that he had created a false identity to ingratiate himself with paedophiles, with the aim of gathering information to help convict them. The judge said the jury had seen through his claim and “unmasked” him.
• Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222 in England and Wales, 0808 801 0302 in Scotland, or 0800 0246 991 in Northern Ireland. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html
