Shropshire Star

Man who had 10,000 indecent child images on computer is spared jail

A man who had nearly 10,000 indecent images of children on his computer has been spared jail.

Published

Charles Turton handed his computer over to police and told them that there was 'no point denying it' after officers turned up at his former home in Telford.

Mr Nigel Booth, prosecuting at Shrewsbury Crown Court, said: "When police officers entered the home address they seized a Toshiba hard drive.

"Within that hard drive they found the indecent still and moving images."

A total of 9,752 indecent images were found on the hard drive.

Of those, there were 1,174 still and moving images which were category A – the most serious.

They also found 2,246 category B still and moving images and 6,332 at category C, the least serious.

Mr Booth said: "The defendant said to police that there was no point denying it.

"He also accepted indecent material would be found.

"The police evidence indicates that there was also a selection of children's clothing found."

The 45 year old, formerly of Telford but now living in Aberystwyth, Wales, admitted six counts of making indecent photographs of children at a previous court hearing.

Turton also pleaded guilty to a charge of possessing a prohibited image of a child and a single count of possessing an extreme pornographic image. The charges relate to a period between November 2008 and May 2014.

Mr Paul Smith, for Turton, said: "At the time of these offences he had been an inpatient at a psychiatric hospital on many occasions.

"He initially was given treatment in the community which was trimmed back and he was, quite frankly, struggling. He does not now have these difficulties and looks back on that period with great regret and remorse."

Judge Peter Barrie said the offending clearly passed the custody threshold because of the high number of images and the number of the most serious category A ones – but opted to suspend the jail term.

Turton was sentenced to 10 months in prison, suspended for 18 months. The judge also ordered him to co-operate fully with a sex offender programme, complete 20 days of rehabilitation work with the probation service and carry out 150 hours of unpaid work. He was also made the subject of a sexual offences protection order and barred from working with children for life.

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