A 55-year-old man committed “forensic suicide” when he sent sick messages and pictures to “girls” he thought were young teenagers, a court has heard.
Anthony Williams was actually communicating with a member of a paedophile hunter group and another adult woman – who soon turned over the evidence to the police.
Despite downloading and distributing videos of young children being sexually abused Williams escaped being sent to jail when he appeared at Inverness Sheriff Court today.
Williams, who previously lived in Kenneth Street, Inverness, but is understood to be now living in Drumnadrochit, also sent photographs of himself, gave his date of birth and sent a video of himself performing a sex act.
When his internet equipment was examined, the horrific videos were discovered.
His lawyer, solicitor advocate Shahid Latif said: “It was forensic suicide. This was 44 days of madness in his life. The offences were unsophisticated and it was only a matter of time before he was caught. And he was.”
Sheriff Eilidh Macdonald decided against jailing Williams although she expressed her disgust at his actions.
She told him: “The sad reality is that if I send you to prison, it won’t be for long enough for you to be rehabilitated.”
The sheriff said she would impose restrictions on Williams’ life to try to ensure there was no repeat.
She placed him under three years social work supervision, on the sex offender’s register for the same period and instructed him to participate in a sex offender’s rehabilitation programme.
Williams must also allow police or social workers to check any internet-enabled device he owns at any time and not to delete any web history of sites he visits.
‘Under fives being abused in the most painful way’
Sheriff Macdonald added: “You derived sexual pleasure from communicating with children. It does not matter that they were not but it is also fortunate.
“You also had graphic images of children under the age of five being abused in the most painful way and it is unfathomable that anyone can derive sexual pleasure from this.”
He also pleaded guilty to downloading and distributing indecent images of children at a house in Chattan Avenue, Inverness, between September and October, 2019.
The court was told that a volunteer member of a paedophile hunter group posed as a 12-year-old girl called “Sophie” on social media and was communicating with Williams.
They became increasingly sexualised and he said he wanted to meet her, fiscal depute Susan Love said.
During this time, Williams was also sexually communicating with a woman posing as a 13-year-old called “Amber”, asking her for intimate photographs, and sending her a video of himself performing a sex act.
After Williams was arrested, his mobile phone was examined and the obscene videos were found and evidence that they had been distributed.
