A partially sighted man from Great Sankey, Warrington, downloaded more than 1,000 indecent images of children, including very young girls being raped.
A judge told Colin Butler, “These are disgusting depraved images of children.”
A court heard today (Thur) that even the defendant admitted, “What I have done is absolutely abhorrent.”
He “begs for mercy” and has taken steps to address his offending behaviour, said his barrister Eva Salter.
Derek Jones, prosecuting, told Liverpool Crown Court that police raided Butler’s home in Cavendish Close, Great Sankey, on January 24 having received intelligence about indecent images being shared.
Butler did not face any charges relating to distributing but analysis of his iPhone and a tower computer revealed 1101 such images, said Mr Jones.
Butler aged 32, admitted he had been downloading and viewing images for “several years” and went on to tell a probation officer he had been doing so for six years.
“Most of the images on the phone were stored in a secret folder,” said Mr Jones, who told how one was called “School” and another “Hidden Pictures.”
The websites he had been viewing were also indicative of his interests as they included, “Shy Teens” and “Petite Teens.”
The majority of images, which were in all three categories of seriousness, were on his iPhone but there were 103 in the two lowest category on the tower.
The images showed boys and girls aged between approximately five and 16 and included at least two showing girls aged about four.
He also had four images of extreme pornography and nine cartoon-style prohibited images, said Mr Jones.
Butler pleaded guilty to six offences involving possessing indecent, extreme pornographic and prohibited images and downloading indecent images.
Eve Salter, defending, said that the defendant has no previous convictions and has shown remorse.
He was diagnosed with the eye disease, keratoconus, when he was 13 which caused blurred vision and intolerance to light which was why he was wearing sunglasses in court, she explained.
She said that he is now focussed on the future and was eager to take part in the ‘Stop It Now’ and ‘Horizon’ programmes to deal with such behaviour.
He has been using a worksheet from ‘Stop It Now’ which has been helping him, added Miss Salter.
Judge Katherine Salter said that he must know the devastating effect and long-lasting consequences that such abuse has on the children involved.
She said he had been frank when confronted and there is concern that he is isolated and suffering from depression. He had an unsuccessful eye transplant operation in 2017 and his condition worsened and he was medically retired from work.
The judge sentenced him to six months imprisonment suspended for 18 months and ordered him to carry out 45 rehabilitation activity days.
He also has to sign on the Sex Offenders Register for seven years and the judge imposed a Sexual Harm Prevention Order for the same length of time.
Colin Butler outside court
