A former ICT teacher from Greater Manchester has been sentenced to 16 years in prison after police uncovered more than a million up-skirting images of pupils on his devices. Matthew Gilkes, 47, formerly of Harrison Road in Chorley, was arrested in 2024 after being traced leaving a leisure centre in Chorley where he had been taking pictures of children.
Police seized over 80 devices from his home, including memory cards, cameras, spy pens, and a school-issued laptop, which contained thousands of indecent images of children. Many of the images were of pupils at the high school where he taught, taken using cube cameras and cameras disguised as pens.
Gilkes also created fake social media accounts posing as a teenage boy to contact underage girls, pressuring them to send indecent images. He pleaded guilty in November 2025 to 42 charges, including up-skirting, sexual communication with a child, possessing indecent images, and causing or inciting a girl aged 13 to 15 to engage in sexual activity.
At Preston Crown Court, he was jailed for 16 years with an additional five years on licence and handed an indefinite sexual harm prevention order. Detective Constable Holly McClave of Lancashire Constabulary's Exploitation Team described Gilkes as a 'highly dangerous man' who had groomed and exploited young girls for his own sexual gratification.
DC McClave praised the bravery of the victims and hoped the sentence would provide some sense of justice. Lancashire Police urged anyone affected by sexual offences to report them, assuring victims they would be believed and supported.
