A paedophile given a “direct alternative to custody” for having nearly 700 hours of child abuse videos has been given another community sentence after being caught again.
Connor Sangster, 27, who has been downloading filth since he was 17, was found with another 34 hours of sickening material when he was already working with social workers after the first offence.
The kitchen porter from Arbroath was given the chance to avoid prison last November and the latest offences “overlapped” so court-imposed “supports were in place but hadn’t really kicked in”, according to his solicitor.
At Dundee Sheriff Court on Wednesday, Sheriff Jillian Martin-Brown, who had delivered the previous prison warning, told Sangster she was impressed with his progress and opted to not jail him.
‘Positive’ social work report
Fiscal depute Christine Allen said: “Police Scotland got confidential information that the user of the Google account associated with the accused had uploaded child sexual material to the internet.
“Category A, B and C videos and picture files of boys and girls aged from three to 12 were found.
“There were 443 images and 227 videos with a run-time of 34 hours.”
Sangster admitted possessing and downloading illicit material at his home between August 15 2013 and October 31 2022.
Sheriff Martin-Brown imposed three years of supervision.
She placed him on the Sex Offenders Register for the same period and ordered him to carry out 200 hours unpaid work and attend the Tay Project.
She said: “The social work report is very positive.
“You have made a tremendous start to your unpaid work and got the majority of the hours done already.”
She said the impact of her latest sentence would be to add another six months supervision to the period to which he was already subject.
Police raid led to first case
In that case, the same court heard how Sangster had a huge stash of nearly 5,000 videos.
Fiscal depute Marie Lyons told the court Police Scotland were given a tip-off outlawed material may be found at his family home in Arbroath.
An early-morning raid was carried out and Sangster told police: “I won’t waste your time.
“You will find what you are looking for. It’s on my phone, laptop and SD card.”
Sangster admitted two charges of downloading and possessing indecent images of children between November 1 2013 and April 22 2021.
Sheriff Martin-Brown placed also placed him under a conduct requirement, restricting his access to the internet and banning him from having unsupervised contact with anyone under 16.
She told Sangster that she was not jailing him because he was a first offender and said the sentence imposed upon him was a direct alternative to custody.
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