A Lavington man found with a large number of serious child abuse images is not helped by his history of similar offending, his lawyer concedes.
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But solicitor Joe Blackshield still put to Albury Local Court on Wednesday that Graham Jones was “quite genuinely remorseful” for his crimes.
When arrested, Jones was already subject to an order prohibiting him from being with children.
Jones fronted court for sentencing via a video link to Junee jail, but the bespectacled 47-year-old’s face was barely seen as he slumped forward at a table.
Magistrate Rodney Brender decided to sentence Jones on Friday, in order to ensure he gave sufficient weight to the level of criminality inherent in the particular images he possessed.
Detectives saw Jones standing outside a shop in Parkland Crescent, Lavington, on November 15 just after 3pm.
They found he had 0.1 grams of methamphetamine and a one terabyte hard drive containing 93 photographs and two videos.
Seventy-five of these photos depicted children aged between four and 10 involved in sexual activity.
Consideration was given in court to whether some of the photographs, of a teenage girl – sourced by Jones from Facebook – were child abuse images.
Prosecutor Sergeant Andrew Coombs said these were submitted because Jones probably downloaded the photographs because of the girl’s cleavage.
Police had later found two USB drives containing 2000 child abuse images in a cupboard at Jones’ then South Albury home.
Jones previously pleaded guilty to four counts of possess child abuse material, possess prohibited drug and contravene a prohibition order.
He once spent seven months in jail for indecently assaulting a child and for having a large quantity of child abuse material.
An order was made against him on October 17 that he be on the child offenders register for five years.
At the time of his latest arrest, police made him move house as he was living in South Albury opposite a child-care centre and a park.