Eirias Road,Colwyn Bay,North Wales - Colwyn Bay man escapes jail for child porn offences

Published date: 19 October 2015 | 

Published by: Staff Reporter
Read more articles by Staff Reporter

A 50-year-old man who’d led a law-abiding life had a secret in the “murky shadows” – he was looking at internet child porn, a judge said on Friday.

Robert Edward Head, of Eirias Road, Colwyn Bay, received a ten months suspended jail term and 18 months community order to address his offending.But he must also register as a sex offender for ten years and a sexual offences prevention order was made at Caernarfon crown court, limiting his internet use.

Police went to his home in March after information from the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre. Prosecutor Matthew Curtis said :”He indicated there was a part of him that wanted to be caught. He assisted them in their search and seizure of equipment from the address.”

Counsel said the children were as young as three and mainly girls. There were 922 images and some movies.

Head admitted making and possessing child porn.

Gwyndaf Pari, defending, said the offending occurred at a time of difficulties in his personal life. Head was suffering from depression and drinking.

The father had shown remorse and voluntarily attended a course on internet offending run by the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, a child protection charity.

Head was assessed as having a low risk of re-offending, the lawyer added.
Judge Geraint Walters told the defendant :”To all intents and purposes you were leading a wholly law-abiding life. But in the murky shadows of your existence there was this secret that only you knew.

“At a time in your life when you were lonely and had little interest in anybody or anything you took to the internet in order to look at pornography and, as is often the case, you moved from one type of pornography to another.”

The judge remarked :”The biggest myth of all is that no harm is being done to the child. The reality is every time a person views that image, the child is being abused again.

For full story see - http://www.northwalespioneer.co.uk/news/153901/colwyn-bay-man-escapes-jail-for-child-porn-offences.aspx