The jury found Shegu Bobb guilty of seven charges including an act of indecency against an 11-year-old girl.(ABC News: Luke Stephenson)
Canberra man Shegu Bobb has been found guilty of sexual offences against an 11-year-old girl he met on a dating app.
The ACT Supreme Court jury cleared Bobb of two charges, including one of rape, but rejected his claim he thought the girl was 19 when he chatted to her on the app.
Bobb will remain free on bail until he is sentenced in October.
A Canberra man has been found guilty by an ACT Supreme Court jury of sexual offences against an 11-year-old girl he met on a dating app.
Shegu Bobb, 27, was initially charged with nine offences, many of them related to the highly sexualised communications between the pair on the app Badoo, as well as events in a car after the pair met.
Today, the jury found Bobb guilty of seven charges, including using a carriage service to procure a child under 16 for sex, as well as transmitting indecent messages and images to the girl.
He was also found guilty of one act of indecency committed in the car, although he was cleared of a charge of rape.
The court heard the girl listed her age as 19 on the app.
Bobb said he believed this to be the case even after he met her, telling the jury he thought she was just a "petite 19-year-old", perhaps with an eating disorder.
The key question for the jury was whether he knew the victim was underage or not.
The court previously heard Shegu Bobb began talking to the 11-year-old on dating app Badoo.(Facebook: Badoo)
During their online conversations Bobb told the girl to be careful of "creeps and stalkers" on the site, and that he would look after her.
When the pair began to plan a meeting the girl told Bobb she was "excited, but a little scared".
"This will be our secret, tell no-one," he said to the girl.
Bobb had expressed concern about meeting near the girl's house, saying it "makes me look like I am trying to kidnap you".
The pair eventually did meet, and drove off into bushland where the act of indecency was said to have occurred.
Prosecutor Marcus Dyason told the jury it had to decide not just whether Bobb knew the girl was underage, but also what happened in the car.
"At the time of the offence we say the accused knew [she] was a child," Mr Dyason said.
"He knew he was trying to engage an underage child in sexual activity.
Mr Dyason challenged Bobb's assumption she was an adult because you had to be an adult to sign up for Badoo.
He said in cross examination Bobb had admitted people lied on such sites, something he had done himself.
Prosecutor Marcus Dyason told the jury the victim initially lying about what happened to her was evidence of her trying to protect herself.(ABC News: Ian Cutmore)
One issue in the case was that initially the victim lied about what happened to her, saying it had been a stranger.
Mr Dyason said this was evidence of her trying to protect herself, avoiding the whole truth because she feared the wrath of her mother.
He urged the jury to rely on her account to the court, including when she acted out what occurred in the car.
But Bobb's lawyer, James Sabharwal, told the jury it should consider the many lies the girl had told.
He said that included a diary entry where she said he had told her to get out of the car, squeezed her neck and said, "You will never tell anyone or I will kill you and the people you love".
The girl had also told her friend she didn't take her phone with her when there was evidence she was texting Bobb inside the car.
"It's difficult to believe people who tell fibs," Mr Sabharwal told the jury.
He noted it was not Bobb who first introduced the subject of sex in their online chats, which also suggested he had grounds to think she was older.
In the end, the jury accepted Bobb did know she was underage, although it threw out two charges related to events in the car, including one of rape.
Bobb will remain free on bail until he is sentenced in October.