August 2011

Ex-nurse caught with child porn stash spared jail term

A former psychiatric nurse who possessed thousands of child porn images and a film depicting bestiality, has avoided being sent to prison.

A judge told Mark Dawkins that although the custody threshold had been crossed, he would be given a suspended sentence.

Leicester Crown Court heard that Dawkins was arrested in March last year at a health centre in Leicester where he worked and that his then home in the city was searched.

Prosecutor Alan Murphy said: “He said he encountered child pornography 10 years earlier when he was looking for adult porn.

“He said he was interested in images of teenage girls.”

The defendant told police most of the images he had viewed were of level one – the least serious – or level two, although he had previously seen images of all levels.

He also said there were two films on his computer.

Dawkins said he knew what he did was wrong “but as it was only on the computer he said it didn’t seem real”.

Mr Murphy said: “There were 4,276 images at level one of girls between five and 15 years old, one of level four and 21 examples of extreme pornography.”

A level four movie showed sexual activity involving an adult woman and a horse.

When interviewed, Dawkins said “he did not know why he saved a film involving bestiality,” said the prosecutor.

Dawkins confirmed he was the only person who had access to the images

The 40-year-old, formerly of The Towers Hospital in Leicester, admitted at an earlier hearing three counts of making indecent images of children in March last year and two counts of possessing extreme pornography involving a total of 21 explicit images of human sexual activity with live animals between January 2009 and March 2010.

Mitigating, Sarah Porter said her client was a psychiatric nurse but “as a consequence of his conviction he has lost his job and will ultimately be struck off”.

Miss Porter said Dawkins was addicted to the type of behaviour which brought him before court “but he is actually quite relieved that he has been caught”.

Dawkins, who had no previous convictions, now lives in High Street, Earl Shilton.

Passing sentence, Judge Charles Wide QC told Dawkins the sheer number of images and the fact that there was a “revolting movie” involving a five or six-year-old child and a number of extreme images, took the case significantly beyond the custody threshold.

He said the public would rightly be very concerned if he did not pass a custodial sentence but he noted Dawkins had lost his career, pleaded guilty and had shown remorse.

Dawkins was given four months imprisonment, suspended for two years, with two years supervision and told to participate in a sexual offender programme.

He was prohibited from working with children indefinitely and given a sexual offences prevention order restricting his use of computers that will last indefinitely.