Anthony Scales pleaded guilty to possessing child abuse material. Photo / 123RF/Posed by model
Anthony Scales pleaded guilty to possessing child abuse material. Photo / 123RF/Posed by model
A paedophile in the UK accessed vile child abuse material on the internet with the user name "I'm a paedophile 123", a court has heard.
Police found more than 1000 images on electronic equipment belonging to Anthony Scales, 64, the Derby Telegraph reported.
Derby Crown Court heard from Scales' defenceteam that she was driven to seek out the material by her gender dysphoria.
Anthony Scales now identifies as a woman.
The Telegraph reported that the judge hearing the case dismissed that argument and instead found that Scales "got sexual gratification" from the disturbing activity.
Prosecutors said that police confiscated Scales' electronic devices following a visit to her address in July last year.
Prosecutor Lucky Thandi told the court that "the defendant had the user name 'I'm a paedophile 123' and there were search terms for 'Lolita' and 'pre-teen'."
Scales pleaded guilty to possessing the images but her defence blamed her "gender dysphoria", the Telegraph reported.
"She has suffered gender dysphoria all her life and this was the defendant's initial motivation to embark on this," her lawyer argued.
Judge Nirmal Shant handed down a 12-month sentence, suspended for two years, and said Scales had "an addiction to young children".
"In your pre-sentence report it seems to me you sought to minimise what you have done and you present a worrying scenario to the court," the judge said.
"[In my view] your sexual identity was not the cause of you viewing these images.
"You received sexual gratification viewing them."
Along with the suspended sentence, Scales was also placed on the sex offenders register and ordered to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work.
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