April 2014

Boys’ Brigade leader jailed for more than two years after haul of indecent images of children found at his home

Sick Gordon Spence, 49, gathered thousands of pictures and videos of children over more than a decade and shared them with other paedophiles online. 

Police found more than 8000 images stored on various devices after raiding Spence’s home in Rutherglen in February 2013.

Spence, a former captain at a number of different BB companies in the south of Glasgow, admitted downloading and distributing indecent images.

Glasgow sheriff Lindsay Wood told Spence there was no alternative to jail before sentencing him to 28 months. He will also remain on the sex offenders’ register for 10 years.

The court heard that Spence denied taking any of the indecent images himself, saying they were all down-loaded from the internet.

A BB spokesman said: “We have a policy on safeguarding young people and all leaders undergo a criminal record check.

“There are approaching 12,000 BB leaders in the UK and although cases such as this are, thankfully, very rare, they are always distressing.

“However, it is important that this case should not eclipse the otherwise excellent work done by our voluntary leaders.”