A POLICE constable who arranged to have sex with a 15-year-old runaway while investigating her disappearance has been jailed sentenced to four years behind bars.

Leigh Brightman, 37, of Tennyson Ave, Hitchin, Hertfordshire, was assigned to the girl’s case in August 2014, and was aware the teenager may have been working as a prostitute.

Brightman called and texted the girl to discuss sexual services, arranging for her to travel to his house by taxi.

The Old Bailey yesterday today heard it was not the prosecution’s case that the pair had sex, even though they met at his property, and he did not tell the victim he was a police officer.

Kevin Barry, prosecuting, said: “He knew perfectly well her vulnerabilities, her age at the time, and must have known what a very serious breach of his responsibilities and duties as a police officer that represented.”

The court heard He claimed to have been handed an escort card with a phone number, and had no idea he was contacting the missing girl.

The victim, who sat in court with her mother and cannot be named for legal reasons, shook her head at the defendant’s explanation.

In a statement read to the court, she said she had been enduring the “very worst time” of her life when she met Brightman and the incident drove her to self harm.

She said: “I’ve suffered psychologically, I’ve had trouble sleeping, and I’ve had horrendous flashbacks.”

“I felt dirty, ashamed, but partly stupid ... I had no idea who he was because he had lied.

“I don’t think I’ll ever go back to my old self, and I will always have trouble trusting people.”

Brightman pleaded guilty to three counts of misconduct in a public office on the day of his trial, and also admitted two counts of downloading indecent images of a child between 2011 and 2014.

The court heard he also had sex with two other women, who cannot be named, he met through his police work – one who was in her 20s and another in her 40s.