September 2003

Council man jailed for sick child porn

A PERVERT snared by police as part of an international crackdown on child porn has admitted downloading sick images of children.

Sitting at Newcastle Crown Court, Judge Beatrice Bolton yesterday said the case of Kenneth Elrick was the worst she had seen in a decade.

Elrick, 39, of East Boldon Road, Cleadon, a former council CCTV operator, pleaded guilty to downloading indecent images between May and December 2001.

He was jailed for 15 months with an extended licence period of three years. He will register as a sex offender for 10 years.

The court heard how a horrific 18-minute video, depicting the rape of a teenage girl, was found at his home in Cleadon.

Police raided his address in October last year and found the sick images along with pornographic video clips, on his home computer.

Caroline Goodwin, prosecuting, said 339 images were found along with 92 floppy discs and 20 compact discs.

She said Elrick was in contact with other internet perverts, communicating with each other through e-mail.

She said: “This defendant was clearly accessing websites clearly exploiting children. The most disturbing image shows a very young child in a dog collar, being abused.”

Miss Goodwin said Elrick was arrested on October 7, along with his wife, but she was later released with no charge.

Ian Graham, defending, said in mitigation, that the couple had suffered severely since his arrest and have had to cope with the loss of a child during the investigation.

Sentencing Elrick, Judge Bolton told him: “The video found in your possession was appalling. It was a recording of the rape of a child.

“You are someone who gets excited at children being humiliated and that is extremely worrying. This is the worst case I have seen in ten years.”