A north-east painter who admitted downloading child pornography will not be punished, after appeal court judges yesterday rejected a plea by prosecutors to have his sentence overturned.
Stanley Burgess was granted an absolute discharge by Peterhead Sheriff Court, despite being caught with almost 50 obscene images of children as young as six stored on his home computer.
He argued that the pictures were used as research for his art and not for sexual gratification. When quizzed about the illicit files – some of which involved graphic sex acts between adults and children – he said he could not see how his actions had harmed anyone.
Yesterday, the Crown Office referred the case to Edinburgh’s Court of Criminal Appeals, claiming the 58-year-old from Fraserburgh should not have escaped punishment.
But the case was rejected after lawyers acting for Burgess successfully argued that Sheriff James Hendry had made the right decision.
Prosecutors had claimed that because the case was deferred after Burgess initially pleaded guilty, he was technically convicted of the offence and could not be discharged absolutely.
The sheriff court previously heard that police, acting on a tip off, raided the former lorry driver’s home in Lochpots Road and seized computer equipment.
Burgess admitted a charge of taking – or permitting the taking of – indecent photos of children between November 2008 and June 2012.
But he insisted he should not be punished because he had not downloaded the images for sexual gratification, but to study light and shade.
The court was told 47 illicit files were found on Burgess’s hard drive, most of them at the lower end of the court’s indecency scale. However, a handful were rated at level three.
Solicitor Stuart Flowerdew argued in court his client’s computer contained thousands of other non-pornographic images, including pictures of the environment and nature.
Sentencing Burgess, Sheriff Hendry told him: “In effect, these objectionable and illegal photos were like needles in a haystack.
“I believe it’s appropriate that you receive an absolute discharge.”
