An Auckland Internet buff has been found guilty of four pornography crimes and cleared of two others in what is seen as an important test case.
Desmond John Millward, 54, of Kohimarama could spend a year in jail or pay a $20,000 fine after an Auckland District Court judge yesterday found
he made copies of "particularly disgusting" images and distributed them for gain.
However, prosecutors failed to prove that Millward possessed pornography for supply under laws written in 1993 that cover films, videos and publications.
Police alleged they found up to 30,000 images of child sex and rape on Millward's computer, including movies, and that he used the nickname Lurker Down Under while a member of an Internet pornography ring called Pedo University.
They claimed that Millward transmitted 19 sexually explicit images on September 1, 1998, that included girls as young as seven.
The officer in charge of the case, Detective Geoff Baber, said Millward's case was one of the biggest in New Zealand in terms of sheer quantity of pornography. It was "very much a test case" under laws written while the Internet was young.
During the four-day trial there was much legal jousting over the definitions of words such as "distribute," "supply," "gain" and "possession," and whether they applied to circulating electronic images through the Internet.
Judge Michael Hobbs said while summing up yesterday that the prosecution had failed to prove that Millward received "valuable consideration" by offering images for hire or sale over the Internet. He was therefore not guilty on two charges of possession for supply.
However, he was clearly guilty of the other charges.
"The computer files promote the sexual exploitation of children in the most explicit and reprehensible way," Judge Hobbs said.
"It is child pornography of a particularly disgusting kind."
Millward was remanded at large for sentencing at the end of this month.
