A British Airways pilot of Ghanaian origin has been sentenced to eight years and four months in prison after being convicted of serious sexual offences involving a 12-year-old girl he met on Instagram.
Kwame Yeboah, 30, a UK national and First Officer with British Airways since 2023, first made contact with the child in late 2025.
Prosecutors said the victim initially claimed she was 17, but it should have been apparent to Yeboah that she was significantly younger, given her references to school and images she shared in uniform.
Over a period of months, Yeboah allegedly groomed the girl through regular phone calls, sending explicit images of himself, and engaging her in increasingly sexualised conversations, leading her to believe she was in a relationship.
Senior Crown Prosecutor Thomas Hanlon said:
“He groomed the victim into believing she was in a relationship with someone who cared about her. In reality, he was an adult man who abused his position and exploited her for his own sexual gratification.”
In February, he travelled from Reading to the Wirral in Merseyside, where he met the girl, drove her around, and later took her to a secluded area where the offences took place.
The victim later told Merseyside Police she struggled to process what was happening and felt nervous and confused.
A friend of the victim told her mother about the assault after a few days, and the mother in turn, reported the matter to the police. Yeboah was identified using details he had given the child.
When arrested, he answered “no comment” to all questions. He, however, pleaded guilty to three counts of rape of a girl under 13 and one count of sexual assault of a girl under 13 on April 22.
In addition to the prison sentence, he was given a 15-year restraining order.
