Prison for Burnley pervert who downloaded child porn (From Burnley and Pendle Citizen)
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Prison for Burnley pervert who downloaded child porn
8:57am Friday 8th March 2013 in News By Wendy Barlow, Court reporter
Christopher Gallagher
A PERVERT who downloaded nearly 1,500 child porn images from the internet has been locked up for 18 months.
Burnley Crown Court heard how Christopher Gallagher, 61, had already served 15 months behind bars for similar offences but wouldn't accept he had a ‘twisted sexual interest in young children’, or take any steps to deal with it.
Gallagher, who claimed he committed the latest offences because his partner had died, lied to the police, denying he had any indecent images on his computers.
The hearing was told some of the images showed infants as young as two or three. Gallagher also had 172 images of extreme porn.
According to a pre-sentence report, Gallagher, who has a drink problem, was said to "wander the streets" while drunk. He claimed it was a misinterpretation and he would pass out on his sofa.
The defendant, of Florence Street, Burnley, admitted 11 allegations of making an indecent photo of a child and one count of possessing extreme pornography.
He was also given a 10-year sexual offences prevention order, banned from working with children and was placed on the sex offenders' register for 10 years.
The court was told police raided Gallagher's home in May last year and seized two computers.
Police found 879 images at level one, 75 at level two, 263 at level three, 388 at level four and three at level five, the most serious level.
Laura Heywood, for Gallagher, said he had not shared the images with anybody and they were not stored on his computer.
He had viewed the images and deleted them. There was nothing to suggest any contact with children.
She said: “He certainly hasn't gone out wandering the streets with the intention of committing any other offences.”
“It was the death of his partner which led him to look at these images again.”
Sentencing, Judge Robert Altham said Gallagher's offending was significantly aggravated by the fact he had previous convictions for similar offences.
He said: "You appear to be entirely incorrigible so far as this type of behaviour is concerned."
Judge Altham said Gallagher had a “twisted sexual interest in young children”.
