October 2014

Child abuse images land Chester chef in prison

A CHEF has been jailed for almost two years after police found 148 indecent images of children on his computer.

Graeme Anthony-Meaney, of Upton Grange, Chester, was caught after officers received an email containing screenshots and logs of his Facebook and Skype activity.

The 29-year-old admitted possessing the images and one video, and also pleaded guilty to distributing four images to “like-minded” people over the internet.

At Chester Crown Court on Tuesday, Anthony-Meaney was sentenced to 18 months for four of the eight charges, and 12 months for the remainder, to run concurrently.

Judge Elgan Edwards, the Recorder of Chester, also added three months for a breach of bail conditions meaning Anthony-Meaney will spend 21 months behind bars.

The judge said: “You’ve got yourself into a great deal of trouble.

“You’ve never been to prison before but the time has come when you will have a taste of it. If you carry on looking at this kind of filth then you will go to prison again.

“Don’t be wasting your life on things that you would be better off leaving well alone. If you do it again the prison term will be longer.”

The court heard that Cheshire Police had received an email including screen shots and call logs on June 17 last year.

They immediately arrested Anthony-Meaney and seized his computer, which was found to contain a video, 21 images at the most serious category A level, 29 category B photos and 98 category C pictures. All images contained images of young boys, some as young as five or six.

Christopher Hunt, defending, told the court the distribution charges only related to one category B photo and three at category C, and his client – who had worked all his life as a chef – was genuinely remorseful.

He said: “He made full admissions to the police during interview and he was in tears for most of that time. He was in a very distressed state. There’s genuine remorse on behalf of this defendant.”

It emerged that Anthony-Meaney received a 12 month prison sentence, suspended for two years, in 2007 for similar offences.

He recently breached his bail conditions as he neglected to inform police he had been evicted from his Chester home and was staying with a friend in Liverpool.

Anthony-Meaney’s Facebook page states he studied at West Cheshire College and has worked most recently at the Fishpool Inn in Northwich. Previously he claims to have worked at Rossett Hall Hotel in Wrexham, Netherton Hall in Frodsham and Abode Hotels in Chester.