A BUDE man who admitted downloading and possessing indecent images of children has been ordered to participate in a sex offenders’ programme.
Judge Christopher Elwen, imposing a community order on 42-year-old Shawn Dymond, told him that any term of custody would be pointless because it could not be long enough to enable any necessary work to be done with an offender such as him.
He told Dymond, of Monterey Close: “Offenders like you never truly grasp that children who are too young to know are likely to be coerced, either through drugs, threats or actual violence, to participate in these very disgusting practices.
“The chances are they suffer long-term psychological and physical harm.”
Dymond appeared before Judge Elwen for sentence at Truro Crown Court on Friday. He had pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to ten charges involving the downloading of a total of 2,772 images spanning all levels of seriousness .
Of these, 2,235 were at level one, the lowest; 73 at level two, 233 at level three, 220 at level four and 11 at level five, the most serious.
Defence counsel Rupert Taylor described it as a “sad case”.
He pointed out that Dymond was a man of previous good character who had health problems and was on benefits.
Dymond, who will be under probation supervision for three years, was handed a sexual offences prevention order and told to sign the sex offenders register for five years. He was ordered to pay £250 towards the prosecution costs.
