July 2020

Derby pervert had ‘I’m a paedophile 123’ as internet user name

A pervert from Derby accessed the internet via the user name “I’m a paedophile 123” to look at girls as young as eight being violently abused.

Derby Crown Court heard how police found more than 1,000 sick child abuse images when they seized and examined electronic devices belonging to Anthony Scales.

The defendant’s defence team claimed the initial motivation to embark in this disgusting behaviour was gender dysphoria – Scales now identifies as a woman.

But the city’s top judge dismissed that and instead concluded how she got sexual gratification from viewing the vile pictures.

Handing Scales a 12-month jail sentence, suspended for two years, Judge Nirmal Shant QC said: “You plainly have difficulties with your gender but in addition to that you have an addiction to young children

“In your pre-sentence report it seems to me you sought to minimise what you have done and you present a worrying scenario to the court.

“This is a very serious matter and there is a sustained period of time over which you viewed these images.

“(In my view) your sexual identity was not the cause of you viewing these images.

“You received sexual gratification viewing them.”

Lucky Thandi, prosecuting, said police went to Scales’ then address, in Home Farm Drive, Allestree, on July 6, last year after receiving information an internet address there was downloading the horrific images.

She said they took away three electronic devices for analysis which found that between September 2013 and June 2019 more than 1,500 pictures had been viewed.

Miss Thandi said: “The defendant had the user name ‘I’m a paedophile 123’ and there were search terms for ‘Lolita’ and ‘pre-teen’.

“Girls on the images were typically aged between eight and 10.”

Miss Thandi gave sample examples of what the images showed, the most serious of which are too horrific for publication, but involce the rape of very young children

She said one of the category C pictures was of a girl aged 10 to 12 with her underwear pulled down to the floor exposing her private parts to the camera.

Scales, 64 and now of Lansdowne Crescent, Malvern, Worcestershire, pleaded guilty to possession of indecent images of children.

As well as the suspended sentence, Judge Shant placed Scales on the sex offender register for 10 years and handed her a 10-year sexual harm prevention order.

She also ordered her to carry out 200 hours unpaid work.