A paedophile dad was caught out after chatting to a '12-year-old girl' online who was in fact an undercover police officer.
Neil Morris appeared at Liverpool Crown Court to be sentenced yesterday (Thursday) after pleading guilty to eight charges, including engaging in sexual communication with a child, and possessing a hoard of 23,853 images and videos of children being sexually abused.
The vile stash also contained scenes of bestiality involving dead or live animals. Morris, 70, attended court unaccompanied and showed no emotion as he sat in the dock.
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The court heard Morris had previously received a community sentence back in 2010 when he was found with another large collection of indecent images, which came to light after he was blackmailed by a so-called paedophile hunter. Morris was given a Sexual Offences Prevention Order in a bid to prevent him re-offending.
Kate Morley, prosecuting, said the latest offences came to light when police searches were carried out at Morris's home address in West Kirby, Wirral, and another address in Cumbria, where Morris was caring for his sick elderly father.
Ms Morley said Morris had been engaged in sexually explicit online chat with someone who he thought was a 12-year-old girl, but was actually an undercover police officer. A search across all Morris's devices revealed 23,853 indecent images of children, of which 855 were of the most serious (category A) kind. There were also a small number of extreme pornographic images involving animals.
She said: "Morris made a full confession that indecent images of children would be found on his laptop. He told officers: 'I've been chatting. It came back, it's an illness.'"
The court heard that Morris's re-offending began when he found a USB device containing indecent images of children which was missed by police at the time of his first conviction in 2010.
Miss Morley said: "That was his downfall as it triggered his interest again. He described it as a habit and the images as a weird sort of collecting library."
Charles Lander, defending, said: "His mitigation is his guilty pleas and the fulsome submissions made in his police interview. He says it's an illness and an addiction. He is still on speaking terms with his ex-partner and one of his daughters.
"Another sad fact is that the defendant's father, who has since died, spent his final months knowing about his son's activities."
The judge, Recorder Ian Harris, said he was sentencing Morris on the basis of the most serious offence - that of the possession of category A indecent images of children, including videos - with his sentence for the other seven offences to run concurrently.
He told him: "This activity was carried out over a lengthy period from 2017 to 2021. You also attempted sexual communication with a 12-year-old girl, making disgraceful comments to her. This type of behaviour is deeply troubling to every parent and responsible adult in our communities.
"You said the downloading of indecent images was your downfall. How many children have suffered a downfall after being forced into this type of behaviour you enjoy watching? Your downloading of such images only serves to perpetuate such a revolting market."
Mr Harris sentenced Morris, of Bridge Road, West Kirby, to three years and eight months in prison, of which he will serve half before serving the rest of his sentence on licence.
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