Gift Ayoola (Image: South Wales Police)
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A 19-year-old from Cardiff who directed young children to perform sexual acts over video calls, recorded them and sold the footage on to other paedophiles has been jailed for four years.
Gift Ayoola, of Pendyris Street, Riverside, admitted causing or inciting children to engage in sexual activity, making and distributing indecent images, and possessing extreme pornography. Cardiff Crown Court heard on Wednesday that a single buyer had paid him £5,000.
The children he targeted
Prosecutor John Ryan told the court Ayoola had been in contact online with a 12-year-old girl, instructing her to expose herself and to watch as he performed a sex act.
A separate chat involved two girls, one aged between 11 and 13 and the other between two and four. Over video calls, Ayoola told the older girl to carry out sexual acts and to draw the younger child into them.
A library of abuse
Ayoola was first arrested at his Cardiff home in January 2025. Devices seized by police held a “library” of videos and pictures of children being abused – 455 category A images, the most serious classification, along with 401 in category B and 389 in category C. Four of the category A images had been produced by Ayoola himself recording children. Officers also found extreme pornography depicting bestiality.
Selling to paedophiles
Ayoola belonged to group chats on Telegram and WhatsApp, where he circulated indecent images of children and the videos he had recorded. Other paedophiles asked to buy pictures and videos from him – 877 in total – with payments made through PayPal. He acknowledged receiving £5,000 from one of them.
Interviewed by police, he claimed he had been supplied with images of children aged between 16 and 18, and admitted sharing and sending material “due to pressure and to obtain money”.
Arrested again
On March 5, 2026, Ayoola was arrested a second time and found with further indecent images, involving children as young as four. These comprised 14 category A, 15 category B and 22 category C images.
He later pleaded guilty to all the charges. The court heard he was of previous good character.
Mitigation
Defending, Martha Smith-Higgins said Ayoola was still a young man and had been younger still when the offences took place. She told the court he had lost his mother at the age of six and later moved to the UK from his home country, and that he was remorseful.
Sentencing
Judge Vanessa Francis rejected the suggestion that Ayoola was not sexually attracted to children and that his offending had no sexual motive.
She said: “The children you exploited were much younger than you, some were very young indeed. These children required protection and you were encouraging them to pose for extremely harmful material. This was a grievous form of sexual abuse.
“These were not simply images, they were children whose trust and vulnerability were exploited in order to make sexual material.”
Ayoola was jailed for four years. He will be subject to sex offender notification requirements indefinitely and a Sexual Harm Prevention Order for 10 years.
