Paedophile avoids prison despite being found with hoard of nearly 16,000 sickening child abuse images


A paedophile has avoided being sent straight to jail despite being found with a hoard of nearly 16,000 sickening child abuse images that showed youngsters in “physical pain” being raped or sexually abused

David Thompson was in possession of thousands of indecent images when police officers raided his Lingdale home on June 26 and 27, last year.

The images, which also included extreme animal pornography, were found on 11 devices the 52-year-old owned. In total, 1,358 of the horrific images were in the most serious category, a further 995 images were in Category B, and 12,099 in Category C.

Thompson admitted three counts of making indecent images of a child at a previous hearing and appeared for sentence at Teesside Crown Court on Wednesday.

Judge Peter Armstrong said Thompson, who lives a “lonely existence” was “addicted to looking at the images for a long time” and was “unable to work”.
“One thing led to another and that led to you looking at these disgusting images”, he said.
“Images of very young children clearly in physical pain, a high number of which were moving images.
“You have indicated that you have a problem, namely that you have an unhealthy interest in looking at these images.”
Judge Armstrong said that when challenged over the “extreme images” Thompson was “very frank with police”.

Thompson, of High Street, Lingdale, was given a 16 month prison sentence, suspended for two years.

He was also made subject to a 10 year sexual offences prevention order and must carry out 30 rehabilitation days which will involve a sex offender programme.