Man with ‘entrenched fascination’ with porn had 60,000 indecent child images

Police found David Sharpe had 60,000 indecent images of children on his computer Picture: Getty Images (Image: Copyright(c)WiyadaA. (Copyright(c)WiyadaA. (Photographer) - [None])

Sentencing 57-year-old David Sharpe, Judge Rupert Overbury said the images included bondage and the abuse of young children.

He said a total of 10 million legal and illegal mages were found on his computer equipment which demonstrated Sharpe’s “entrenched fascination” with pornography and to some extent child porn.

He described the total number of images found on his computer equipment as “inconceivable” and said the police had a public duty to investigate the extent to which Sharpe was culpable and the harm that had been caused.

He said one police officer had graded more than three million images.

Sharpe, of Boxford Court, Haverhill, admitted three offences of making indecent images of a child between 2005 and 2015.

In addition to being jailed he was made the subject of a sexual harm prevention order for 10 years and ordered to sign the sex offenders register for the same period.

Richard Potts, prosecuting at Ipswich Crown Court said computer equipment belonging to Sharpe was seized by police officers in 2015.

When it was analysed, the devices were found to contain 55 still images and one movie in the highest level A category, 262 images and 37 movies at level B, and 59,999 images and 125 movies in the lowest level C category.

The court heard that Sharpe had been jailed for two years in 1993 for child sex offences. Steven Dyble, for Sharpe, said his client had been arrested in 2015 and was only now being sentenced five years later.

He said his client had not reoffended since his arrest which showed he was capable of being rehabilitated.

He said Sharpe’s home and car had been damaged and he had been taunted in the street following press reports of his case.