Birmingham paedophile nursery worker Paul Wilson has been jailed for life with a minimum term of 15 years for raping a toddler in his care and the online grooming of more than 20 girls.

Wilson, aged 21, who worked at the Little Stars Nursery, in Nechells, was sentenced at Birmingham Crown Court after admitting two charges of rape, 16 counts of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, 25 of making indecent images, and three of distributing images of children when he appeared in court in June.

Wilson, of Newbold Croft, Nechells, had used a mobile phone to film two separate attacks on the infant.

Mrs Justice Macur described his offences as "chilling, vile and depraved" and said Wilson had caused unknown harm to the toddler and more than 20 young girls who were abused online.

Police said evidence from the phone was seized in January when Wilson was arrested for blackmailing a teenage girl into performing sex acts via a webcam.

He is known to have abused the toddler at his workplace, although there is no evidence that further offences took place there.

Passing sentence at Birmingham Crown Court, Mrs Justice Macur told Wilson that any right-thinking person would regard his crimes as wicked.

The counts of rape related to attacks on a toddler committed in a toilet block and a classroom at the Little Stars nursery last year, while the majority of the other offences were committed against girls aged between 12 and 16.

Condemning Wilson as a predatory paedophile, Mrs Justice Macur told him that the offences had been "sophisticated and persistent" in their manner.

Some of the sexual acts which he had incited children to commit via webcams would be viewed in hindsight by the victims with horror, the judge said.

"You have humiliated and corrupted and defiled," she told Wilson. "You are highly deviant, highly manipulative. You are intelligent and the more dangerous for being so."

Wilson, who sat with his head bowed for almost all of the four-hour sentencing hearing, was arrested "from his bed" in a dawn raid at his home on January 5 this year.

Opening the facts of the case to the judge, Prosecutor Shenaz Muzaffer said footage of both rapes was found on a computer tower seized at the address.

A mobile phone and a lap-top were also recovered when Wilson was initially arrested in connection with a complaint made by a teenage girl he had met on the internet.

But as well as recovering evidence of on-line abuse affecting a total of 22 girls living across England and Wales, officers also found two movie files showing the rapes committed at the nursery.

In a statement issued after Wilson was sentenced, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) confirmed that Wilson had used numerous online aliases to gain his victims' trust.

Wendy Bounds, of the West Midlands CPS Complex Casework Unit, said: "Paul Wilson preyed on vulnerable young girls who he encountered in internet chatrooms.

"He hid his real identity and led the girls to think he was a friend and asked them to turn their webcams on and by this means he was able to see them in intimate situations.

"If his initial approach under a false identity was unsuccessful, he would then use multiple further aliases on social networking sites to either gain their trust or threaten them in order to get them to perform sexual acts, which he could watch."

Wilson is known to have raped the toddler on separate occasions about six months apart during his employment at Little Stars, which began in October 2009.

It is known that at least six members of staff at Little Stars had raised concerns about Wilson's behaviour before his arrest, but he had continued to work there despite receiving a written warning.

During her sentencing remarks, Mrs Justice Macur said it was "a matter of some incredulity" that Wilson had not been disciplined further for "deliberate and blatant" flouting of the nursery's rules.

Ms Bounds said it was unfortunate that the concerns raised by other staff members had not prevented the attacks on the toddler.