March 2009

Jail term for pervert who downloaded 20,000 sick pics of kids

A PERVERT from Derby who downloaded more than 20,000 indecent images of children on his computer has been jailed.

Kevin Shutler was tracked down after an internet watchdog gave police a list of subscribers to a website depicting girl models aged 13 and 14.

Most of the photographs and movies found on Shutler’s computers were category one, the least graphic, which describes images of children in erotic poses.

There were 269 images and 14 movies that fell into category two; 17 category-three images and four category-four images. There were no images that fell into category five, which is the most serious.

Shutler, 53, who pleaded guilty to 16 charges of making and eight of possessing indecent photographs of children between December 2000 and August 2007, was jailed for six months.

Sentencing Shutler at Derby Crown Court, Judge Andrew Hamilton said: “These offences are very serious by their nature. The people who took photographs of these young girls are only providing people like you with some form of sexual satisfaction. The fact is that without people demanding photographs like these, there wouldn’t be any market to create them for.”

Derby Crown Court heard how police tracked down Shutler, of Stowmarket Drive, Derby, after he was identified by the Internet Watch Foundation as a subscriber of a website that featured teenage girl models.

Richard Kenwood, prosecuting, said that police searched his home on August 9, 2007, and found the illegal material on various computer hard drives and floppy discs.

Clive Stockwell, in mitigation, said Shutler had no previous convictions and was seeking help.

He added: “As a child, he suffered bullying at school. He had asthma and skin conditions.”

Mr Stockwell said the bullying continued when he was in the RAF and later at work.

He said that Shutler had made full admissions to the police, who had put him in touch with the organisation Stop It Now, which works to prevent child sexual abuse and has a confidential helpline. Mr Stockwell added that his client had been having counselling.

Shutler was told he must sign the sex offenders’ register for seven years and also abide by a sexual offenders’ prevention order, which included not working with children or owning any software that could delete his internet history or encrypt data.