Abdi Waise was convicted of supplying class-B drugs, one count of kidnap and four counts of attempted kidnap

An illegal Somalian immigrant is facing jail after trying to kidnap children by posing as a policeman weeks after being released early from a jail sentence for rape.

Abdi Waise, 28, was supposed to be deported after serving six years of an eight-year sentence for raping a young woman he snatched off the street in 2008.

But a deportation order from 2013 was stayed after the jobless migrant, who came to Britain at the age of ten, appealed on human rights grounds.

Only three weeks after the sex offender was released on licence in January this year, he struck again – kidnapping one schoolgirl and trying to abduct four other children over two-and-a half hours as they walked to school in Hornsey, north London.

Waise struck on January 18 this year. His kidnap attempts started at 7.30am when he chased a ten-year-old boy, offering him £10 and cannabis if he went with him.

A short time later he stopped a schoolgirl and tried to search her bag claiming to be a police officer. He followed her until the girl pointed him out to her parents. Minutes later he approached another girl, grabbing her wrist, telling her he was a police officer looking for his daughter, but she managed to wriggle free.

At 8.10am, Waise blocked the pathway of two girls and accused them of buying drugs. He attempted to lure them a nearby garden so he could search them, but they ran off.

Posing as a plain-clothes police officer, Waise then tried to kidnap an 11-year-old girl, putting his arm around her and trying to convince her she should come to his house for breakfast to look at some photos.

He grabbed her bag and coat, but she managed to run away. At 9.10am he grabbed another girl by the shoulder at a bus stop, but she was able to escape. He also attempted to search schoolgirls after accusing them of buying drugs.

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Shocking CCTV footage shows Waise harassing one of the five girls he attempted to kidnap in a two-and-a-half hour period in North London

When the ruse failed, Waise then targeted a group of schoolboys, offering them £20 if they could get girls to take liquid isopropyl nitrate, known as poppers.

He claimed it would make the victim faint and said, 'If you give it to girls you can do what you want to them', but the boys refused.

Prosecutor Edward Franklin said: 'He tried to use force and intimidating behaviour to stop the children and divert them to accompany him.

'Fortunately those children got away and many of them continued to school where they reported the incidents, others told their parents.'

Waise targeted a group of schoolboys, offering them £20 if they could get girls to take liquid isopropyl nitrate. He claimed it would make the victim faint

Yesterday at Wood Green Crown Court, Waise was convicted of supplying class-B drugs, one count of kidnap and four counts of attempted kidnap. A further charge relating to the attempted kidnap of a 15-year-old girl was laid on file after the jury were unable to reach a verdict.

Details of the deportation order, which was served in 2013, were revealed after yesterday's verdict. It was issued following his 2009 conviction for throttling and raping a 21-year-old woman in Edmonton, North London back in August 2008.

It is believed Waise remained in the UK because he was appealing against the order on human rights grounds. Yesterday Judge Witold Pawlak expressed astonishment that he was not deported, saying: 'If he had been deported then, all those children would not have gone through their unfortunate experiences.'

He said the criminal, who has a string of previous convictions including robbery, theft and possession of cannabis, was 'dangerous'. Before he was convicted of rape, Waise was also charged with sexual offences including an attempted rape that involved throttling, but in both cases the charges were dropped. Waise is due to be sentenced next week.

Outside court, Detective Sergeant Gareth Coffey said: 'He is an illegal immigrant. He was appealing against the deportation at the time and that was why he had not been deported.'

DCI Paul Trevers, in overall charge of the investigation from Haringey CID, said: 'Waise went out with the plan of abducting a girl. When deception didn't work, he became increasingly forceful. Fortunately all the girls saw through his ruse, and whilst frightened, all made it away safely.'

A number of illegal immigrants and foreign criminals have been deported from the UK to war-torn Somalia. They are either flown back on chartered private jets, which are often half-empty, or on scheduled flights via another African country – at vast expense to the taxpayer.

Yesterday, it emerged that ministers have squandered a staggering £57million flying foreign criminals and failed asylum seekers home on private jets over the past five years. Scheduled flights for deportations are thought to have cost the taxpayer at least an additional £30million.