A convicted paedophile was employed by an acclaimed British charity working with vulnerable children in Ukraine after “serious failings” in its vetting procedures, The Telegraph can reveal.

Siobhan’s Trust, which distributed pizzas to children and families suffering following Russia’s invasion of the country, hired the man with few, if any, background checks.

The 52-year-old, who called himself Jack Morgan, made regular visits to orphanages, schools and camps for displaced people after being employed to work on the charity’s operations in west Ukraine from early 2023.

Photographs posted by the charity and its volunteers on social media showed him playing with young children.

Suspicions about Morgan began to surface among the aid community in the city of Lviv after he began boasting about joining the Foreign Legion of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and claiming he was raising money for military supplies on its behalf.

Sources described how “all hell broke loose” when his true identity was first exposed in a group chat for the Lviv volunteer community in August 2024.

Volunteers who worked with Morgan told The Telegraph that he was paid £500 a month and given full use of vehicles owned by Siobhan’s Trust, which later changed its name to HopeFull.

These included a “large van with a built-in pizza oven” and a “refrigeration van”, which Morgan drove to and from sites where vulnerable children were present.