A paedophile given a "significant chance" with a suspended sentence after being caught with child abuse images went on to repeat the offending, a court has heard.
When Jonathan Meadows' offender manager visited him at home during a routine visit she saw he was using a social media application under a different name - and that led to an examination of his devices which uncovered almost 100 indecent images along with prohibited images and extreme pornography.
Swansea Crown Court heard the youngest children in the images were estimated by police to be aged between six months and 12 months. Sending the defendant to prison, a judge told him that the pictures he had downloaded were of real children somewhere in the world being horribly sexually abused so people like him could masturbate over them.
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Sian Cutter, prosecuting, said in April this year Meadows' offender manager conducted a monitoring visit at his house, and when she checked his phone she saw he was logged into social media and messaging app Discord under the name Julie Shepherd. The court heard that under the terms of a previously imposed sexual harm prevention order Meadows is banned from having social media accounts in any name other than his own unless he registers them with police.
The prosecutor said the discovery of the unauthorised social media name led the policewoman to seize the defendant's electronic devices. On his phone and an SD memory card officers subsequently found a total of 95 child sexual abuse images - including 17 Category A pictures and videos showing the most extreme forms of abuse including rape - along with 56 prohibited images, and five images of extreme pornography. Miss Cutter said the estimated age of the youngest child in the photographs was between six months and one year.
Jonathan Adrian Meadows, 30, of Clyne Court, Sketty Park, Sketty, Swansea, had previously pleaded guilty to three counts of making - that is possessing - indecent images, possession of prohibited images of children, possession of extreme pornography, and breaching a sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) when he appeared in the dock for sentencing. He has one previous conviction for seven offences - in 2020 he was given a suspended prison sentence and made the subject of a SHPO for three counts of making indecent images, three counts of distributing indecent images, and possession of extreme pornography.
Dan Griffiths, for Meadows, said the defendant was at pains to point out to the court that there was "no sinister motive" for having the Discord account in a different name - he said his client intends to transition and Julie Shepherd is the name he wants to adopt. He said his client realised that he should have told police about the account in the name of Julie Shepherd, and he said it had to be accepted that Meadow's engagement with the 2020 court order had been "superficial".
Judge Paul Thomas KC told the defendant he had been given a "significant chance" with the imposition of the previous suspended sentence but it was clear he had learned nothing. The judge told the defendant that possession of indecent images was not a victimless crime and the photographs he downloaded showed real children somewhere in the world being horribly abused so people like him could masturbate over them.
With a discount for his guilty pleas Meadows was sentenced to 21 months in prison comprising 12 months for breaching the SHPO and nine months for the image offences charges to run consecutively. He will serve up to half that period in custody before being released on licence to serve the remainder in the community. He will be a registered sex offender for the next 10 years, and the existing SHPO was allowed to continue.
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