A paedophile caught in a worldwide operation against child porn has been jailed for four months.
George Emerson, 50, admitted downloading porn onto his computer and a further charge of taking photographs of young girls in Arbroath while on bail.
Jailing the former electrical engineer, Sheriff Norrie Stein said: “The images were of shocking gravity and included children as young as three or four.”
Scottish police were informed about Emerson as a result of an FBI investigation known as Operation Ore, which has resulted in more than 1,000 arrests in the UK alone.
Arbroath Sheriff Court heard that Tayside Police had recovered 2,160 “horrific images” of young children being sexually abused.
Emerson had printed off dozens of the most disturbing pictures, had them laminated and kept them in his loft of his home in the town’s High Street where he lived with his wife and three step-daughters.
Viewed on television
After his arrest on the porn charge, he was granted bail but was caught breaching its conditions when a shop assistant saw him taking photographs of girls under 16.
He pleaded guilty to taking photos of the girls without their knowledge or consent and viewing them on his television set.
Nick Markowski, representing Emerson, said: “On occasions when he was on his own, he initially started to go on the internet to look for hardcore porn and transsexual porn but was drawn to two sites that contained these illegal images.
“It is clear to me that it is more specialist help that Mr Emerson requires if he is going to stop offending.”
He has been placed on the Sex Offenders Register for seven years and all his computer equipment has been seized.
