Instagram child sex predator Cameron Robert Bowen confesses, facing jail for abusing a girl he never met in person

With his confession to committing sex crimes via Instagram – this predator has completely changed Australian law and will now face jail.

An Adelaide man has made legal history by admitting his abuse of a teenager, via social media, was as heinous as face-to-face sexual assault and deserving of a maximum life sentence.

In the District Court on Friday, online predator Cameron Robert Bowen pleaded guilty to one count of having maintained an unlawful sexual relationship with a child.

Until now, that charge – which carries a maximum life sentence – has been levelled only at offenders who abuse victims via two or more in-person sexual acts over a prolonged period.

By his plea, Bowen has acknowledged his ongoing online abuse of an LGBT youth amounts to repeated, separate incidents of sexual assault.

He confessed to abusing the girl at least five times between May 2015 and January 2018 by causing her to perform sex acts upon herself, at his direction, via Instagram.

The landmark admission sets a precedent for the punishment of online sex offenders around the country, and was the result of a joint effort by Commonwealth and state prosecutors.

It will allow courts to weigh online offending as heavily as “contact offending”, and sentence accordingly.

It also follows the court’s comments, in a separate case on Wednesday, that “image-based sexual assault” had “devastating consequences” for victims.

Cameron Robert Bowen. Picture: Facebook

Australia’s worst-ever child sex offender, former RAAF Sergeant Jacob Donald Walsh.

Bowen, 32, of Salisbury, was charged with 45 child abuse offences for using an iPhone and multiple fake Instagram accounts to pose online as a woman and pursue LGBT youth for sex.

He was mentored in his offending by Australia’s worst-ever child sex predator, former RAAF intelligence expert Sergeant Jacob Donald Walsh.

The state’s elite Joint Anti Child Exploitation Team (JACET) arrested Bowen first, and investigations into his activities led detectives to Walsh.

On Friday, prosecutors asked the court to postpone Bowen’s arraignment, saying his counsel had “proposed a resolution” to 44 of the 45 charges he faced.

Bowen’s lawyer, however, urged the court to immediately accept his client’s plea to maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a child.

Doing so would, he said, “preserve the discount” available to Bowen for a timely guilty plea.

Judge Geraldine Davison took Bowen’s guilty plea to the single charge and remanded him in custody to answer the remaining charges next month.