American jailed over child porn

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/northern_ireland/8481682.stm

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A man extradited from the United States on charges of having images of child abuse has been jailed for nine months.

IT consultant David Boatright, 43, was arrested in 2003 but after his first court appearance, he absconded back to the US, where he was from originally.

Boatright, of Upperton Drive in Old Mossley, was arrested in Miami last May and extradited in September.

Belfast Crown Court was told how police uncovered more than 2,300 images on his hard drive and other storage media.

During police interviews in January 2003, Boatright admitted he had downloaded all the images, including 24 movie files, and had also on occasion used his own credit card to access pay-per-view websites.

He later pleaded guilty to 28 charges of making indecent images of children on various dates between January 1999 and July 2002.

His defence lawyer said there was no suggestion he had abused any child himself, nor that he ever would.

Jailing him for nine months with a further year on probation, Judge Tom Burgess said it was "self-evident to anyone (viewing the images) that the children are suffering both physical and mental anguish".

"It would be clear to any right-minded person that the effect of the assaults will leave long-lasting scars in circumstances where the children have no help or support - for all those reasons, custody is fully merited," he added.