Gay porn addict's prison let off

A Rotorua man caught in an international FBI sting for importing thousands of child pornography images has escaped a jail sentence.

When Daniel Sturm pleaded guilty recently he was warned he was likely to go to jail.

Judge Ian Thomas yesterday said he recognised the Rotorua 43-year-old was doing his best to get help for his addiction to gay websites and was needed by his sick and elderly parents.

He sentenced him to 350 hours of community service and two years' supervision.

The maximum penalty for importing child pornography is five years' imprisonment or a $10,000 fine and the New Zealand Customs Service, which prosecuted Sturm, wanted him jailed for up to nine months.

At sentencing yesterday his lawyer, Brian Foote, pointed out Sturm had until recently been employed for 17 years as a display operator and had no previous convictions.

A pre-sentence report said Sturm was willing to get help and was a low risk for reoffending.

"These charges have been a huge wake-up call to this defendant. As a positive, he has self-referred for counselling. He needs help to figure out why he has done this," Mr Foote said.

Sturm had previously pleaded guilty to four charges of knowingly importing child pornography. A Customs investigation found Sturm had imported 13,000 sexually explicit images and movie files of men.

More than 9000 images and movie files were found in one folder which included thousands of images of young boys in sexual poses or involved in sexual activity.

He admitted regularly viewing child pornography and looking at sites containing sexually explicit images of naked boys aged 8 to 17.

Sturm told Customs officials to take everything to prevent him from viewing the sites and images. He said he wanted to stop using the internet because of his addiction.

About November 11, 2005, the department received information from the FBI in the United States about New Zealand residents subscribing to overseas websites featuring child sexual abuse images.

Sturm was identified as one of those residents. He told Customs officials he had been paying an amount each month to access child pornography sites.

Sturm said he was he was addicted to gay sites and kept looking for younger boys.

New Zealand Customs Service lawyer Chris Macklin told Judge Thomas yesterday that Sturm's current lack of employment and need to be at home to look after his parents meant he would be living an even more "reclusive" lifestyle. He said that was not the best environment for someone with his addiction.

However, Judge Thomas said Sturm would not get treatment for his problem in prison because he would not be there long enough.

He warned Sturm that although he was not sending him to jail, that did not mean his offending was not regarded as very serious.