An Aberdeenshire paedophile was caught with even more child abuse images while still waiting to be sentenced for the first haul.
Daniel McGladrigan already had a previous conviction from 2021 after being found in possession of 600 indecent images of children and nine hours of sickening footage hidden in encrypted files.
The 22-year-old’s first offence led to him being monitored by the sexual offender policing unit.
When it carried out an unannounced home visit in January last year, officers analysed a tablet device and discovered indecent images of young girls aged between 12 and 15.
McGladrigan appeared in the dock on Monday to be sentenced for an additional charge of possessing 48 indecent images.
Fiscal depute Carol Gammie told Aberdeen Sheriff Court that two detectives visited McGladrigan at 10.15am on January 22 2022.
They were given consent to examine several devices.
Ms Gammie said: “An electronic tablet device belonging to the accused was manually examined by the officers and was found to contain what was suspected to be indecent images of children within the ‘recycle bin’ of his Google Images application”.
The tablet was seized and forensically examined and found to contain 47 Category C images and one Category A image, the most serious.
The images were no longer accessible to be viewed by McGladrigan and could not be accurately dated.
‘Large number of visits’ to website
However, they were created at some point between the purchase of the tablet on January 10 2020 and its seizure on January 22 2022.
Further analysis found that in a two-week period between May and June 2021, the device was used to make a “large number of visits to a website known to host indecent images of children”.
Numerous webpages with names indicative of child sexual abuse and exploitation had also been accessed.
McGladrigan pleaded guilty to taking, permitting to be taken or making indecent images or pseudo-images of children.
Accused ‘under no illusions’ about second crime
Defence agent Stuart Beveridge told the court: “He is under no illusions as this is his second offence for this sort of behaviour and the court will consider all options, including a custodial sentence.
“But he is a young man who accepts he has made a mistake and his position is that this happened back in 2021 whilst he was 20 years of age.
“He’s currently working with the social work department and that is going well, so, if he is given the chance for that to continue, then perhaps that could stop his offending behaviour.
“Mr McGladrigan is obviously concerned about adverse publicity from today’s hearing.”
‘Very reckless’
Sheriff Philip Mann told McGladrigan: “I think you’re right to be concerned about being sent to custody.
“Once is bad enough, but committing the same offence whilst you’re waiting on the sentence for your first offence is very reckless.
“The only things that stop me from sentencing you to a custodial sentence are that you are 22 and have not reached full maturity and that you a cooperating well with the social work department.”
As an alternative to a prison sentence, Sheriff Mann sentenced McGladrigan to a community payback order with supervision for three years and ordered him to carry out 120 hours of unpaid work.
He also fined McGladrigan, of Greeness in Cuminestown, a total of £1,000 and placed him on the sex offenders register for five years.
The sheriff also ordered McGladrigan to take part in a sex offender rehabilitation programme.
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