February 2016

Paedophile had over 230,000 indecent images of children

A MAN who spent six years amassing tens of thousands of “disturbing and graphic” images of child abuse has been jailed.

James Haw, of Cherry Hill Grove in Poole, was snared by investigators after sharing seven of the images on Twitter.

Police raided the 37-year-old’s home in July last year, seizing his laptop, tablet and a hard drive.

In total, around 230,000 images were discovered on the three devices, a large percentage of which were indecent images of children, a court heard.

The volume of both still and moving images was so high that police were unable to view and categorise all of them.

As a result, Haw was charged with ten counts of possessing indecent photographs of children, with the allegations covering 4,478 category A stills and 57 films, 4,806 category B stills and 57 films and 8,794 category C stills and eight films.

He also faced a charge of possessing an extreme pornographic image and two counts of distributing indecent images.

The defendant, who admitted the charges, appeared at Bournemouth Crown Court for sentence on Friday, February 19.

Prosecuting, Tom Wright said Haw had admitted downloading the material over a six-year stretch, and had frequently visited a website which assists internet users in concealing their IP address.

Mr Wright called the number of images found “overwhelming”, highlighting one “harrowing” sample image found of a very young girl being subjected to sexual torture.

Leslie William Smith, mitigating, said: “One of the first things [the defendant] said to me was, ‘The arrest was a real weight lifting off of me’.”

Mr Smith said Haw, who was supported in court by family, had initially become addicted to adult pornography.

This addiction led him to the Darknet – a network that can only be accessed with specific software – and eventually to the images of child abuse.

“Most [of the images] were never viewed,” the barrister said, adding: “He feels self-disgust and self-loathing.”

Haw has sought help from child protection charity Lucy Faithfull Foundation.

Sentencing the defendant to 18 months in prison and a sexual harm prevention order, Judge Peter Johnson said there was an “element of sophistication” in the defendant’s efforts to conceal his IP address.

“Police have not been able to categorise all of the images because of the sheer volume of them,” Judge Johnson said.

“There is something in the order of a quarter of a million images.”