A convicted child rapist from Warrington is back behind bars after being caught with disgusting child abuse images.
George Bushell was jailed for 15 years in 2012 for seven sex offences including three rape counts.
The paedophile was released on licence in late 2019 but a court heard this week that police raided his home in Warrington in December 2021 after receiving information about his IP address using peer-to-peer file sharing to download indecent images of children.
Chris Hopkins, prosecuting, said that a HP laptop and a USB stick were seized by officers and sent for forensic examination.
“Bushell was interviewed and said he may have inadvertently downloaded indecent images of children.”
Liverpool Crown Court heard that there were a total of 20 indecent images on the devices, involving all three categories of seriousness. These included two videos in the most serious category on the laptop and five on the USB stick.
Mr Hopkins pointed out that one of the videos found was 20 minutes long and showed a child being raped.
Examination of his laptop showed Bushell had viewed internet sites involving nine and ten-year-olds.
The laptop had Tor Browser installed to prevent online tracking and also file deletion software, said Mr Hopkins.
Bushell, 45, who was recalled to prison after his arrest, with an expected release date of 2027, was re-interviewed in January this year but made no comment.
The defendant, formerly of Froghall Lane, Warrington, pleaded guilty to three offences of downloading indecent images of children and one of possessing them.
Stella Hayden, defending, said that Bushell’s greatest mitigation was his guilty pleas.
He had been released from prison in 2019 and was in sheltered accommodation. He struggled with his mental health and sought help but this was not forthcoming because of the pandemic.
“He accessed this material when at his lowest point.”
Judge Denis Watson, KC, sentenced Bushell to two years imprisonment though pointed out that this starts today as he did not have the power to make it consecutive to the rape sentence that he has been recalled to serve.
He said that the case was “substantially aggravated’ by the fact he had tried to conceal offences and also had a file shredding application on his laptop.
Also there were Category A videos including one 20 minutes long, the judge added.
