Pervert arrested four times in four years over child abuse images is finally jailed at Leeds Crown Court

Andrew Sawyer escaped a prison sentence in 2013 after being caught but continued to search out the vile material, Leeds Crown Court heard.

The 44-year-old admitted 23 separate offences dating between July 2016 and February 2021.

Judge Mushtaq Khokhar told him this week: "These are very serious offences that you have been committing repeatedly.

"In 2013 you were sentenced for possessing indecent images of children and received a non-custodial sentence and you did the sex offending programme.

"You learned nothing. You knew you were in trouble but you carried on and you were not concerned about the consequences.

"The time has come to learn that you can't go on committing these offences, it's about time you changed your lifestyle."

Prosecutor David McGonigal said that police first arrested Sawyer in September 2017 and found hundreds of images that he had downloaded to his phone over a 10-month period.

They included Category A - the most serious child abuse pictures - along with Category B and C, prohibited pictures of children and extreme images of people performing sexual acts with animals.

During interview, he told police that he "must have felt horny that day" and there would be "no harm in looking".

He was arrested again while on bail in April 2018 and his phone seized, leading police to find hundreds of abuse images and videos and more bestiality images.

Officers found that he had also been chatting to other perverts online and shared material.

He was arrested again at his home in Outwood in April 2020 when more images and videos were recovered.

Hundreds more images were found on two phones when Sawyer, of Mountbatten Crescent, was visited again by police in February 2021.

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Satpal Roth-Sharma, mitigating for Sawyer, said he had been a hard-working man who worked in telesales but lost his job in 2009. He began to drink heavily and started trying drugs.

She said: "He has an addictive personality, he spent a lot of time looking at adult porn and that progressed.

"His explanation for doing this was to simply fill his days and occupy his time."

A probation report said there was a high risk of Sawyer offending again.

Jailing him for 40 months, Judge Khokhar said: "I would be failing in my public duty if I did not impose a custodial sentence."

He also said he would be subject to an indefinite sexual harm prevention order, which will limit his internet use, make it illegal for him to delete his search history, and gives the police access to his electronic devices at any point.

The court heard that he had been held on remand since February last year.

This article was first published by the Wakefield Express.