A JUDGE criticised a three-year delay in a case reaching court – before letting a man who built up a library of child abuse pictures and films walk free.

Malcolm Place was given a suspended jail sentence today after Teesside Crown Court judge Deborah Sherwin said the lengthy wait made “a nonsense” of justice.

Place was caught with almost 300 moving and still files which he downloaded from the internet, prosecutor Emma Atkinson said.

The 46-year-old was on holiday with his wife when police raided his then-home in Dormanstown, near Redcar, in June 2014, and seized computers.

When he returned five days later, Place contacted officers and a voluntary interview was arranged for a further three days ahead, the court heard.

Place handed over a prepared statement in which he admitted files had been downloaded, and he would be fully responsible for anything that was found.

The three computer towers were examined, and an expert’s report detailing the number of type of images was completed by February last year.

But Place was not interviewed again until last October, when he submitted another prepared statement admitting he was guilty of the allegations.

It appears as though charging advice was not sought from the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) until this year, and he was summoned to court last month.

Before magistrates, Place, of Westfield Court, Dormanstown, admitted three charges of making indecent images of children, and was sent to the crown court.

Judge Sherwin told defence lawyer Sarah Lish: “I’m concerned by the delay in this case. He has had it hanging over his head for a long time.”

Prosecutor Emma Atkinson said many similar prosecutions were being held up because of the backlog of work the computer experts have on their hands.

Judge Sherwin said: “I appreciate everybody has funding constraints and all sorts of problems like that, but it does seem particularly unfortunate in cases like this where, whatever the outcome may be, it makes a nonsense of it having to look at it so far down the road.”

The court heard that Place is on “gardening leave” from his job, and bosses were planning to decide on his future once the court case was over.

Judge Sherwin told him: "It seems to me it is appalling in this case how long you have had to wait for this matter to come to court.

"It is in nobody's interest, because any work anybody could have done with you would have been better done two years ago than now, but we are where we are.

"Any offences which involve young children being sexually abused is a serious matter, and some of these were particularly unpleasant examples of that.

"Given the delay in this case, it is an appropriate case for me to suspend the custodial sentence."

He was given an eight-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, with supervision, and ordered to sign on the sex offenders’ register for ten years.