A Keith man caught with thousands of indecent images of children told police he viewed them out of “nosiness” and not for sexual gratification.
Over the course of a decade, Duncan Morrison, 59, amassed more than 2,000 sick pictures on his devices, including some that were category A, the most severe.
The images featured girls between the ages of one and 16, Inverness Sheriff Court was told.
Morisson admitted two charges relating to the downloading and possession of the images.
Fiscal depute Emily Hood told the court that police had searched Morrison’s home in Nelson Terrace, Keith, in relation to an unrelated matter on April 14 of last year.
“During this search, a laptop containing category C images of children was recovered,” the fiscal depute explained.
As a result of this, a further warrant was granted and Morrison’s home and car were searched, with several devices seized.
Duncan Morrison: ‘I was stupid’
Morrison was then cautioned and charged and told officers: “I was stupid.”
At interview, Morrison told police that he would search for “young females” online and was “aware they were children due to their development”.
“He stated that he did this due to nosiness and would not get sexual gratification out of it,” Ms Hood said.
The court heard that investigations uncovered 2,143 category C images, as well as 123 category B images and 175 images classified as category A – the most severe.
The majority of the images were in inaccessible locations and not readily available to the device user.
There were also three inaccessible videos, two of which were category A.
The files had been created between July 2009 and May 2020 and were stored in various locations on the devices including the downloads file and the recycle bin.
Solicitor Robert Cruickshank, for Morrison, told the court his client was a first offender and asked Sheriff Robert Frazer to call for a criminal justice social work report prior to sentencing.
Sheriff Frazer deferred sentence for the production of the report and placed Morrison on the sex offenders register with immediate effect.
