REVEALED: Undercover spy who infiltrated Swampy’s Newbury Bypass eco-warriors is unmasked as paedophile who tried to have sex with children as young as six

The undercover spy who foiled the eco-warriors behind the Newbury Bypass protest in the 1990s has been found guilty of trying to have sex with children under six.

Special Branch hired a freelance agent to infiltrate a group of activists living in tunnels beneath the construction site and provide vital intelligence that allowed the police to sneak them out of the burrows.

His identity remained a secret for 30 years.

But the Mail can reveal the spy is Edward Gratwick, who was convicted of 38 child sex offenses yesterday.

The 68-year-old man was arrested at Stansted Airport on March 7 as he tried to fly to Bucharest to sexually abuse a Romanian schoolgirl after making an arrangement with the child’s mother.

National Crime Agency officers raided the airport after receiving intelligence from foreign authorities just hours earlier. Three children are currently in protective custody, the agency said.

Gratwick had discussed plans to exploit children with multiple people in the UK and abroad; Some of these were parents propositioning their daughters for sex.

He spoke to other pedophiles via encrypted messaging apps and offered to help them provide children in exchange for money.

In these conversations, he boasted that he had sex with a nine-year-old girl in the Dominican Republic.

Gratwick’s passport showed that he had traveled extensively around the world, including Sierra Leone, the Dominican Republic, Morocco, Europe and the United States.

Investigators said they were looking into whether he actually abused children abroad as he claimed.

Wayne Johns, head of child sexual abuse investigations at the NCA, said Gratwick’s chat records were the most depraved conversations his team of experienced child abuse detectives had ever witnessed.

“A special team, very experienced in their field, had to examine these messages and the fact that they pointed out how horrific they were was evidence of the level of aggression,” he added.

When police searched Gratwick’s home in Mitcham, south London, they found 69ml of the ‘date rape’ drug GBL, a central nervous system depressant, in the fridge drawer.

In his messages, he talked about giving drugs to children so that they would not remember the abuse they experienced.

Detectives also discovered 1,364 indecent images of children on their devices.

Gratwick, 68, was recruited by Special Branch in 1996 to infiltrate a group of eco-warriors living in tunnels beneath the Newbury Bypass construction site.

The Mail today revealed the spy was a pedophile convicted of trying to have sex with multiple children around the world

Jurors at Gratwick’s trial were informed that he gave police information about animal rights groups between 1995 and 2003.

They were not told that in 1996 he successfully infiltrated and dispersed a group of protesters, including activist Swampy, and played a pivotal role in building the controversial Newbury Bypass.

Hundreds of activists flocked to Newbury and initially climbed trees in the area where the bypass would be built.

When expert lumberjacks cut down trees, they dug underground tunnels and lived in these tunnels for nine months, knowing that heavy machinery would not be driven into them in case the tunnels collapsed and killed those inside.

Faced with a stalemate, Thames Valley Police recruited Gratwick, a spy working for a private security company with unique skills that would allow him to infiltrate the group.

Gratwick, also known as Nick, managed to gain the trust of the group leaders and provided important information about the perfect time for the police to attack the 90ft long, 10ft deep main tunnel.

At midnight, he told the officer that the entrance was guarded by only one man and one woman, while a third protester was sleeping in the main entrance shaft.

When the male protester came out of the tunnel to urinate, police caught him.

When his girlfriend went out to look for him, he was also taken into custody and officers made noise to remove the third person.

The tunnel, which took nine months to build, was seized within minutes and the Newbury Bypass was opened in 1998.

Gratwick was paid around £1,000 a week for his work; this was a small fraction of the £8 million spent policing the protests up to that point.

Newbury bypass protesters chained themselves to trees to prevent them from being cut down

Some protesters were also living in trees but experts were brought in to safely cut down the trees

When the trees were cut down, they dug tunnels 10 feet underground and moved into these tunnels; They were safe knowing that construction vehicles would not be driven from above for fear of causing a collapse and killing someone.

Activists were so unaware of his true identity that he was able to use the credibility he gained from the Newbury protests to infiltrate an animal rights group who were later demonstrating at the Hill Grove cat farm in Witney, Oxfordshire.

He remained undetected within the group’s ranks and passed intelligence to the authorities, but his efforts were not as successful as in Newbury, and the cattery was closed in 1999 after two years of violent protests in which 350 people were arrested and 21 were jailed.

During his crime, Gratwick would make supervision recommendations against the parents of children he planned to abuse.

He told a mother who was worried her house was being watched that she bought a time-activated plug that could turn the lights on and off to give the impression that she was home when she wasn’t.

He also spoke to the same woman about a particular top he wanted his daughter to wear, saying: ‘[she] ‘Will look great with a sleeveless top’.

When stopped at Gratwick airport, officers found items in her travel bag, including a timed plug and a small child’s sleeveless top.

Gratwick also attempted to use his intelligence-gathering background as a defense at his trial, claiming that he tried to identify pedophiles and turn them over to authorities.

“I wanted to do something about it because I had a lot of experience with intelligence and chat rooms,” he told the court.

Thames Valley Police hired an undercover spy, whom the Mail revealed was Gratwick, to infiltrate the protest group in the tunnels.

Gratwick succeeded in his mission and provided vital intelligence that allowed police to remove protesters from the tunnels.

He presented evidence that he had his contacts tested for sexually transmitted diseases, photographs of children being abused, and evidence that he brought date rape drugs to show that he was a legitimate pedophile.

“These were promoters of originality,” Gratwick told jurors.

‘I gently kick the hornet’s nest to see what flies away.’

Mr Johns said: ‘There was no indication that he had contacted anyone with a view to providing this information to the authorities, he had nothing to support this such as an evidence file on his devices.

‘We have not found any information to support his claim that he is trying to eliminate sex offenders through his behavior.

‘On the contrary.’

Gratwick had not reported to any agency about his activities and had not been tasked with pedophile hunting in the past; therefore, jurors understood these allegations and convicted him of 38 counts, including arranging or facilitating the commission of sexual offenses against children. He previously admitted possessing class B drugs.

NCA senior investigating officer Danielle Pownall said: ‘Gratwick has consistently denied the offenses he faced, despite overwhelming and indisputable evidence showing his lack of remorse and disregard for the safety and welfare of children.

‘I would like to offer my sincerest thanks to the jury members who have considered harrowing evidence over the last six weeks that no one should ever have to hear.

‘Work continues with our international partners to identify Gratwick’s contacts and we will do everything we can to protect children from harm wherever they are.’