Man jailed for 25-year-old collection of indecent images of children

A man has been jailed after being caught with a collection of indecent images of children dating back more than 25 years.

Francis Stevenson was sentenced to 27 months in prison after he admitted possessing and downloading indecent images of children.

The 58-year-old committed the offences between May 1993 and last June in Finzean in Aberdeenshire.

At Aberdeen Sheriff Court yesterday, his solicitor Peter Keene claimed that his client was “ripe for rehabilitation”.

He asked that Stevenson, who lives at The Park in the Ealing area of London, instead be sent on a course to prevent him from reoffending.

Mr Keene said his client had suffered injuries in an accident at work and with “all that time on his hands, and in pain, he turned to pornography”.

But Sheriff Morag McLaughlin decided that jail was the only option – due to the graphic nature of the images.

She told the accused that she reached her decision “because of seriousness of the images and the length of time you held them”.

In addition to his more than two years in prison, Stevenson has been put on the sex offenders register for 10 years.