BUSINESSMAN Mark Bayley downloaded depraved images of child sex abuse from the internet – some of them involving very young children.
Bayley, of Cross Lanes, Wrexham, was spared an immediate prison sentence when he appeared at Mold Crown Court yesterday.
He received a 12-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, was placed on supervision and was sent on an internet sex offender programme.
Bayley, 53, must register with the police as a sex offender for a decade.
A 10-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order was also made and he was ordered to pay £300 costs and an £80 surcharge.
The judge, Mr Recorder Richard Williams, said a significant volume of images of children being sexually abused had been found.
The nature of the images were of a particularly depraved character, he said, and involved still and movie images of child victims, some as young as the age of one.
He said one image in particular depicted a child of six in an act which must have resulted in serious physical harm or mental trauma.
The judge said Bayley’s own description of his interest that that kind of image seemed to an extent to minimise what he was doing and the harm that having such images in circulation caused.
But he accepted the risk Bayley posed would be reduced significantly by intervention.
His risk of re-conviction was low and there was no evidence of direct sexual interest in children.
According to the judge, there was sufficient prospect of rehabilitation to justify a suspended sentence.
Bayley pleaded guilty to three charges of making indecent images of children in categories A, B and C by downloading them from the internet and possessing 1,530 such images.
He admitted three charges of making indecent movies of children by downloading them from the internet and possessing 880 such movies.
Bayley denied a ninth charge of possessing a prohibited image of a child and that was allowed to remain on the file.
Prosecutor David Mainstone said police became aware that Bayley’s IP address was being used to access indecent images of children and a warrant was executed at his home in June last year.
On the computers was an extensive collection of child sex abuse images. Search terms had been used to look for such images and file sharing software had been used by which he received images. He had not distributed any. Some of the images involved very young children.
A man of good character, he made no comment in interview.
Nicholas Williams, defending, stressed the offences were committed by downloading images off the internet, not by making images afresh.
The file sharing software had been there to download music but he accepted that at some stage it went far beyond that and continued for some time.
It was an aggravating feature that some images involved very young children but Mr Williams said the majority of images were of young teenage girls.
Mr Williams said Bayley’s fiancée, who had lived with him for eight years, supported him and described him as a man who was trustworthy, caring and compassionate.
Mr Williams said it was clear that in the small community where they lived, as a result of press reporting, people had stopped talking to them and they had become somewhat isolated. He had lost friends and he had lost his good name.
His business had been damaged. Having worked for many years as a contracts manager, in May last year he set up his own business supplying services to the manufacturing industry.
It had been relatively successful at the start but as a result of the proceedings being reported he had lost quite significant contracts which has made it more and more difficult to run that new business.
The impact of his offending had been significant before he was sentenced, said Mr Williams.
But he was fortunate to have good friends who had written references on his behalf and who told how they continued to trust him to be a big part of their family life.
The pre-sentence report showed a number of issues needed to be dealt with, said Mr Williams.
Bayley was said to be in denial about the motivation behind his offending and it was suggested extensive offence focus work was needed to address the factors that were present.
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