A JUDGE told a defendant he did not believe his account that he sought out and stored downloaded indecent images of children, “for investigative purposes.”

Durham Crown Court heard that was the explanation Michael David Hedley, 25, gave to police after they removed items of computer equipment from his home, when they visited armed with a search warrant.

The court was told that following a Hampshire Police tip-off, officers visited the address, in Skippers Meadow, Ushaw Moor, near Durham, on February 10, last year. The Northern Echo understands Hedley no longer lives at that address.

They removed a mobile phone, a tablet computer, a laptop and an ageing work station for examination.

Jane Waugh, prosecuting, said the phone and tablet were found to contain 15 indecent child images in the most severe category for such material, plus ten other offending pictures, classified in either B or C categories.

Hedley was interviewed and was said to have been co-operative, giving police the necessary passwords for the devices.

Miss Waugh told the court: “He said he was compiling images intending to pass them on to the police, but he remained in possession of them without lawful authority.

“He said he had legitimate reasons, in order to inquire into the backgrounds of certain individuals.”

Miss Waugh said Hedley had no previous relevant offending history.

He admitted three counts of making indecent images, between February 2015 and his arrest in February last year.

Vince Ward, mitigating, accepted the offences “cross the custody threshold”, but he urged the judge, Recorder Peter Makepeace, to suspend that sentence.

He told the court that his client stands by his account as to why he sought the images, given in his police interview.

The Recorder told Mr Ward: “I’ll suspend the sentence, as there is sufficient help on hand in the community to assist the defendant and to protect the public.

“But, I’ll sentence on the basis that these images were sought out for sexual gratification.”

Imposing an eight-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, he told Hedley: “I don’t believe a single word of your explanation that you were trying to trap someone else.

“We do come across such cases in these courts, but in this case, there’s not one shred of evidence of that.”

Hedley must attend a Probation run sex offenders’ programme and will be subject to restrictions under a five-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

He will have to register as a sex offender for ten years.