Mum confronts Mackay online predator Sean Lachlan Martin

A brave Qld mother has delivered a powerful speech to the “sexual predator” who stole her 12-year-old daughter’s innocence online through his repeated deceit and depravity.

Convicted online predator Sean Lachlan Martin was jailed for manipulating and coercing multiple underage girls into having sexualised conversations with him.

A brave mother has confronted the online “predator” who stole her 12-year-old daughter’s innocence, transforming the once confident and carefree child into a hollow shell filled with self loathing.

Mackay man Sean Lachlan Martin, 46, targeted children online with devastating results.

His vile offending was laid bare in Mackay District Court on February 25-26, 2025.

A victim impact statement read to the court by the child’s mother revealed the full extent of Martin’s deceit and depravity.

The mother was instrumental in Martin being arrested and charged, and ultimately jailed for five years with parole eligibility after one third.

“What should have been a simple desire to make a new friend online instead led her into the hands of a predator,” mother Celia* (name changed) told him.

She said she noticed a change in her daughter immediately.

“Seemingly overnight, she became secretive... she withdrew from us,” she read from her statement.

Sean Lachlan Martin’s vile offending was laid bare in Mackay District Court on February 25-26, 2025.

It prompted Celia to look through her daughter’s electronics, and what she found shattered her world.

Over 11 months between 2022 and 2023, Martin had coerced and manipulated the 12-13 year old into graphic sexualised talk and sharing explicit images, even passing on some of the child’s images to other “like minded” people.

The court heard he used the screen name Mouse 280 and claimed to be 28.

He ingratiated himself to the point the child believed he was her boyfriend - they planned to catch up at a caravan park when he visited her area and he wrote in graphic “disturbing” detail what he wanted to do to her.

Just between September and December 222 Martin exchanged 2983 text messages with the child.

The court heard he also used a different account and name to talk to her - she had no idea it was the same person - but his sick modus operandi was the same and he soon turned the conversation sexual, asking for explicit images, including telling her, “I think girls should have the right and freedom to share if they should so wish”.

Sean Lachlan Martin pleaded guilty to a 14-count indictment that including charges for using electronic communication to procure a child under 16, distributing child abuse material using a hidden network, indecent treatment of a child, and making and possessing child abuse material.

“Reading the conversations between Sean Lachlan Martin and my child was like a nightmare I could never wake up from. The sickness, the horror, the helplessness. It consumed me,” Celia told the court.

She immediately put a stop to their communication and phoned the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation; the Australian Federal Police were in touch soon after.

Celia had closed her daughter’s accounts and removed all her obvious electronics but their chats reignited through a backdoor entry online via a Switch game console. It only stopped for good after he was arrested in August 2023.

“Our nightmare didn’t end,” Celia told him.

“(My daughter’s) mental and physical health began to deteriorate.

“I will never forget the day her counsellor told us we must lock away all sharp objects, poisons, and medications because the risk of her harming herself was too high.”

READ THE FULL VICTIM IMPACT STATEMENT BELOW

Judge Gregory Lynham described the offending as “perhaps the most reprehensible conduct” and said it “highlights the dangers of social media”.

“I regard this offending as particularly heinous... you took advantage of the naivety, of the young age of a child... and involved you engaging in reprehensible sexualised communications with her.

“The corruption involved in your offending beggars belief, in effect your offending might be regarded as perhaps every parent’s worst nightmare.

“That their own children could be coerced by an adult motivated by sinister purposes to circumvent the normal guidance and care and sanctity which every child deserves by having sexual predators like you communicating with them ultimately for the purposes of your own sexual gratification.”

Martin pleaded guilty in Mackay District Court to 14 charges, including using electronic communication to procure a child under 16, distributing child abuse material using a hidden network, indecent treatment of a child, and making and possessing child abuse material.