Vincent Chan, a former nursery worker, remained silent during a police interview when questioned about filming himself sexually abusing young girls, including victims as young as two years old. He received an 18-year prison sentence for his crimes at Bright Horizons nursery in Finchley Road, West Hampstead.
Defiant Silence in Police Custody
Dressed in a grey tracksuit with his hair in a ponytail, Chan hunched over and avoided eye contact with the interviewing detective. She pressed him on the placement of hidden cameras in his bathroom, living room, and bedroom, captured on devices seized by authorities.
“Why did you place cameras in your house?” the detective asked. Chan responded, “No comment.”
His female solicitor earlier read a prepared statement: “I, Vincent Chan, hereby confirm that I am guilty of all of the things complained of in the disclosure document.”
The detective continued, “I still have questions of course, and rightly so, because as police we want to understand what has happened and why it has happened.” She detailed the abuse videos, asking, “How do you feel about the videos I’ve told you so far? Do you recall those videos?” Each time, Chan replied, “No comment,” staring at his clasped hands.
Extent of Covert Filming and Assaults
At Wood Green Crown Court, the full scope of Chan’s actions emerged. Prosecutor Philip Stott described recovered videos showing women and girls undressing in their homes, including a naked girl in a pool.
Chan secretly filmed a teenage girl over three years, capturing her in a towel, half-naked while changing in her bedroom, and in school uniform with a friend. His voiceover stated, “You are so sexy.” He superimposed her images onto naked photos of himself, labeling one “jailbait,” and amassed around 2,000 images.
Additional evidence included upskirt videos of schoolgirls from his prior primary school job, footage of himself assaulting an unconscious woman, three women using the toilet, and a pensioner undressing. Chan also collected vast indecent images of children online.
Stott noted, “The victims are all women and girls. They are children as young as two years old, through to adults in middle age and at the other end of the spectrum an adult in her 70s, recorded getting changed in her own home.”
Chan molested girls aged two to four at the nursery, actions described as every parent’s worst nightmare.
