Peter Voisey, 35, broke into the child’s home in North Tyneside when she had been left alone briefly, playing with bath-time toys.

He told her that she would never see her mother again as he forced her into the passenger seat of a car and subjected to two sexual assaults during a 20-minute journey before dumping her, naked and shivering, in a freezing back alley. Voisey, who has a criminal record for sexual offences against children, wept in the dock as he was found guilty of kidnapping and rape by a jury at Newcastle Crown Court at the end of a three-week trial.

Judge David Hodson postponed sentencing until December so that a proper assessment could be made of the dangers that Voisey posed to the public. Judge Hodson told him that he could expect to be jailed for life or for an indefinite period.

The child’s parents remained in court for the verdict but the mother’s partner left the courtroom in tears as the jury delivered the first of a series of unanimous guilty verdicts.

Outside court the girl’s mother said: “My little girl was in the bath in her own home within earshot of everyone else in the flat. The back door was shut and I had only just left the bathroom to go to another room when she was snatched.

“It is every mother’s nightmare to think your children are not safe in their home. You would not think you would have to lock all your doors this early in the evening to protect your children from anyone entering your home uninvited.”

Voisey, who denied his guilt, carried out a sex attack on a 12-year-old stranger at a swimming baths four years ago. He also carried out break-ins that had a sexual element.

A friend recalled Voisey confiding that he wanted to “do something” to a child when they drove past some young children.

Voisey later gave his friend’s girlfriend graphic details of the abduction of the girl that had never been made public. He snatched the child from the ground-floor flat as her mother was in another room drying her brother, a toddler.

The girl, clutching a fluffy pink toy, said in a video link: “I was just playing with my toys when he took me out of the bathroom. He just left me in the back lane. He just drove off. He told me to face the wall and I just started crying. Another man, a nice man, came and took me into his house and it was all warm and stuff. My mum came.”

Asked what the man did to her, she replied: “He put his hand over my mouth. All he said was ‘be quiet or I will hurt you’. I was trying to scream. He just threw me into the car. He drove off with me and then left me in the back lane.”

The child added: “He told me I would never see my mum again.”

DNA samples linked Voisey to the crime. Phone checks on his mobile phone placed him in the vicinity and a footprint at the scene matched his trainers.

Detective Chief Inspector Jim Napier said that he had been convinced from the start by the girl’s account.

He said: “Voisey was a total stranger to this family. He violated their home . . . the conviction should ensure that he is not in a position to harm anyone else for many years.”

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