A jail term has been imposed on a man from Dover who downloaded images of child sexual abuse from the dark web.
Graham Pitcairn was arrested on Tuesday 3 March 2020 after officers from Kent Police’s Paedophile Online Investigation Team received intelligence that a computer at his former address had accessed a website which hosted child abuse material.
A laptop and a USB stick were seized and found to contain more than three thousand indecent images and more than sixty indecent video clips.
More than four hundred of the images were graded as Category A, the most serious category, as were more than thirty of the video clips.
Pitcairn was charged with three counts of making an indecent image of a child and admitted those offences at Canterbury Crown Court on Tuesday 2 February 2021.
The 46-year-old, from Dover, was sentenced to one year and three months’ imprisonment at the same court on Wednesday 31 March.
Following his release, a ten-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order, which was imposed by the judge, will prevent him from accessing the internet, having unsupervised access to children and obstructing police who ensure he complies.
‘The children depicted in indecent images are real children and the crimes committed against them are extremely serious. Anyone who takes part in the trade of these images is complicit in that abuse.
‘My team is committed to identifying anyone who accesses or downloads such images, tracking them down and bringing them before the courts. The Sexual Harm Prevention Order imposed on this offender will prevent him from accessing or sharing such images for a considerable amount of time.’
Detective Sergeant David Shipley, of Kent Police’s Paedophile Online Investigation Team