Description
A CREEP caught sharing hundreds of child abuse images claiming he 'loved lil teens' has been allowed back into the community after a sheriff spared him a prison term.
Mark Webster was placed on a further sexual harm prevention order - restricting his use of social media sites - when he returned to the dock last week.
The 32-year-old admitted to taking, permitting to be taken or making indecent images between April 20 and July 15, 2023.
The sex offender also admitted to a second charge of distributing or showing indecent images from April 20 to July 20, 2023 from his home in Merrick Drive, Dalmellington.
Webster claimed he was "going to sue" our Ayrshire Weekly Press reporter claiming we had "no right to be in" his hearing when he pleaded guilty on December 4 at Ayr Sheriff Court.
Not guilty pleas to further allegations, including that he had possession of extreme pornography depicting females with dogs, were accepted by prosecutors.
A procurator fiscal depute told a previous hearing: "The accused was found in possession of 759 indecent still and moving images from category A to C.
"There was also evidence on his mobile phone of file sharing, suggesting he was involved in distributing child sexual exploitation and abuse material.
"On May 22, 2023 information was received by Police Scotland giving reasonable cause to believe that the accused had possession of indecent material of children. A search warrant was granted and officers from Police Scotland attended his home address on July 20."
Police seized a Samsung mobile phone from Webster's bedroom and informed him that it would be examined.
The fiscal depute added: "An interim examination was carried out on July 21 which confirmed indecent material. On the same date, he returned to his home address and was arrested and conveyed to Kilmarnock police office.
"He made no comment during interview and replied 'nope' to caution and charge. He was released on an undertaking to appear in court."
The court heard that 340 inaccessible category A still images were discovered on Webster's device - the worst level of abuse.
Various chat threads were recovered on one application, Telegram, containing messages from the user requesting details from others to trade in indecent content.
Various acronyms were found that associated him with child sexual exploitation and abuse material.
The fiscal depute said: "Further chats on Snapchat were found and several associated the accused with child abuse material and sending media files. The content of some files is unknown having expired.
"The accused stated he liked young girls and at one point said he 'loved lil teens'."
When he returned to court with his face covered by his jacket for sentencing on January 28, defence solicitor Derek Pettigrew said: "In terms of the report, I can't stress enough his anxiety that he may be going into prison."
Addressing the dock, Sheriff Mhairi MacTaggart said: "Can you take that down from your face please?"
Mr Pettigrew continued: "Clearly some intervention is required moving forward.
"I can see no benefit to a period of incarceration but there is benefit in my lady placing him on an order. He appreciates he will need to be monitored in the community.
"Because of this offence remaining in the Dalmellington area will not be an option for him, so he will have to be somewhere else and monitoring will be necessary."
Sheriff MacTaggart said: "Mr Webster, it's a stark choice for me whether to send you to custody or the community. I have to say on balance I have to consider public protection, and consider getting you assistance to address offending in this way in the hope to prevent offending further.
"The reality is that's not something likely to be achieved by sending you to prison for the amount of time I could send you to prison. You should be in no doubt my primary concern is protecting the community, so there will be very stringent monitoring of you and I'm sentencing you to the maximum period."
He was placed on a community payback order under supervision for three years - and ordered to take part in the Moving Forward Making Changes programme which aims to address sex offenders' behaviour.
He will remain on the sex offenders register for three years.
He was also placed on a strict sexual harm prevention order restricting his internet and social media use for five years.