NOTTINGHAMSHIRE CARER HAD INDECENT IMAGES OF CHILDREN AS YOUNG AS ONE ON HIS COMPUTERS
A carer had indecent images of children on four computers at his home, a court heard.Rodger Thorpe, 49, of Oak Tree Lane, Mansfield, had 139 still or moving images on the devices as well as Tor Browser, a web browser that anonymizes web traffic using the Tor network, making it easy to protect identity online.
Thorpe said he installed the browser for access to certain television sites.
He accepted he downloaded the images of children, which were in all three categories from A, the most serious, to C, of lesser seriousness.
He appeared for sentencing at Nottingham Crown Court on Monday, March 21.
One category A video lasted nine minutes, while a second was five minutes long.
Children were aged between one year and 13 years, and the majority were females aged between eight and 12 years.
Thorpe has three convictions from 1991 for indecent assault when he was 14 to 16 years and the females involved were five years younger than him.
His barrister, Stefan Fox, said Thorpe had pleaded guilty to the offences now before the court.
His client had provided passwords to his devices when asked by police.
Judge Rosalind Coe QC sentenced Thorpe for three offences of downloading indecent images of children.
She said there were 41 Category A images, 30 in Category B and 62 in Category C.
"It is apparent these were on four devices found at your home in November 2020," she told him in the dock.
"They had been downloaded by you over a period of five years.
It is hard to say more than that because it appears some were deleted.
There were moving images that lasted as long as nine and five minutes." And she said his barrister had referred to the offences as abhorrent "as they clearly are," she added.
"These are not victimless offences as you have now come to realise." She said he is a carer for his wife, "who is unfortunately very ill." Judge Coe accepted imprisoning Thorpe would be a hardship as far as his wife is concerned.
A three-year community order was imposed and a requirement to attend an accredited programme for 43 days.
She added 55 rehabilitation days, which she described as "onerous requirements".
Thorpe will sign the sex offenders' register and be on a sexual harm prevention order for five years and must pay costs and a victim surcharge.
