Detective Officer Francois Olwage, 52, is accused of taking care of what he thought was a teenage girl he met online. The counterterrorism officer was actually talking to an undercover detective who used the username “Smile Bear,” he told the Winchester Crown Court. After two weeks of explicit sexual conversations in October 2021, Olwage arranged to meet the “girl” in a park in Basingstoke, Hampshire, where she told him she lived. Ahead of the scheduled meeting, Olwage wrote in a message: “Because of your age, things can go very wrong for us, I could break the law, lose my job, call social services. “I do not want any of this for us, so we can not meet tomorrow for anything sexual, so it can only be about our meeting to talk and spend time together.” Peter Shaw, for the prosecution, told the court that Olwage traveled by train to Basingstoke, where he had rented an apartment for the night. He was arrested at McDonald’s by two undercover detectives after agreeing to buy the girl a McFlurry before they met. When they searched, police found two condoms in his bag, a bottle of lubricant and a pack of tadalafil for erectile dysfunction. There was also a box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates, which Mr. Shaw suggested was a gift for the girl. Olwage has since been expelled from the Met Police. Mr Shaw said Olwage did not answer questions when interviewed by police, but made a statement saying he “never believed Smile Bear was a 13-year-old girl” and “initially assumed this was a fake profile”. . He asserted that his confession had been obtained through torture, but that his confession had been obtained through torture. Mr Shaw said the accused “denied having sexual interest in children and denied that the meeting would involve sexual activity”. Asked about the specific contents of his bag, Olwage claimed that “it always tends to be there when I travel”. Giving evidence at the trial, the undercover officer who posed as Smile Bear and identified himself only as Max, said he had stated that the girl was 13 years old and that Olwage replied: “You are fine talking to me, I could be your dad. ; “ Olwage, from Stevenage, Hertfordshire, denies four counts of child sexual offenses. The trial continues.
