A FORMER newsagent caught in a joint police operation with the FBI for downloading child pornography off the internet was jailed for 12 months today.

Ian Thomas Waller, 45, a father of three children under 16, was caught with 530 indecent images of children aged between six and ten, including some which were classed as sadism.

A large number of printed off images were found under his bed in Norton, Teesside, said prosecutor Harry Hatfield, who refused an invitation to see them saying: "I can assure you they are distressing enough from what I've seen in the past."

When police went to Waller's home with a search warrant at 7.10am on October 29 he told them: "There is no need to search the house, I'll show you where the images are," said Mr Hatfield.

Police seized two personal computers, and sheets of paper containing indecent images along with some adult pornography.

Waller admitted purchasing access to websites offering child porn and downloading the images.

Police computer experts discovered 300 indecent images of children and also CDs containing them, Teesside Crown Court was told.

Waller's wife and family were said to be standing by him. Jamie Hill defending, said: "He was a newsagent but was forced out of business last year."

"It may not be without significance that at the time the business last year failed he started accessing adult pornography on the home computer, and during the course of that he accidentally came across indecent images of children, but then he accepts that he did on a number of occasions deliberately access websites."

Judge Peter Bowers told Waller: "The evil of these offences is that it encourages those who make these pictures to abuse children."

Waller of Seaham Close, Norton, was jailed for 12 months after admitting 16 charges of making indecent images of children over a three year period from January 1999 to April last year.

He was given a three-year extended period of licence so he could attend a Sex Offender's Treatment Programme on his release, and he was ordered to register as a sex offender for ten years.