St Asaph Man Jailed for ‘Astonishing’ Indecent Images Haul

A St Asaph man has been sentenced to two years in prison after being caught with what a judge described as a “truly astonishing” number of indecent images of children.

Andrew Morris, 47, of Llys Dyffryn, St Asaph, had amassed nearly 94,000 category C images over a decade, along with hundreds more in the most serious categories A and B. Police also discovered an additional 600,000 potentially indecent images that were too numerous to investigate fully.

At Mold Crown Court on Thursday, Morris admitted possessing indecent images across all three categories. Police found the illegal material on his phone, laptop and hard drives following an investigation into BitTorrent sharing software on 10th October 2023.

The court heard Morris had 354 still pictures and 76 movies in category A, 927 still pictures and 39 movies in category B, and 93,986 still pictures and 318 movies in category C. An external hard drive contained a further 641,943 images.

Morris told police he had downloaded the material whilst “in the throes of an addiction to pornography”. Defence barrister Simon Killeen said his client had shown insight into his offending and contacted the Lucy Faithfull Foundation.

Mr Killeen argued: “These are people who have gone to dark, perverted places but they have not stepped across that bridge into something far more serious.”

However, His Honour Judge Simon Mills rejected suggestions for community punishment, telling Morris: “You describe this as an addiction. It’s far worse than that. It is obsessive conduct you will have carried out in secret with none of your friends and family having any awareness of it.”

The judge added: “You immersed yourself in this depraved world in a completely and utterly disgraceful way.”

Morris received two years for the category A offence, with concurrent sentences of 18 months and 12 months for categories B and C respectively. He was also made subject to a sexual harm prevention order and sex offender notification requirements, both lasting ten years.