A TENNIS coach who trawled the internet for images of child rape walked from court.

Wantage man David Smith, 69, who used to teach schoolchildren before he retired at 62, was spared an immediate prison sentence after a judge at Oxford Crown Court heard he was remorseful and had already completed courses aimed at tackling his sick behaviour.

Handing him a 10 month prison sentence suspended for 18 months, Judge Nigel Daly challenged comments in Smith’s letter of apology that his online activities “never transferred into the real world”.

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“That may be so, but the children that are depicted in these photographs and images are in the real world and when there are photographs of young children being raped by adults they are experiencing that in the real world,” the judge said.

“And the reason why this sort of offending is frowned upon so much is because if it weren’t for people who one might call consumers, who are watching these images – in some cases, although not in your case – purchasing these images, then the children would not be abused in this way.”

Smith must complete a sex offender rehabilitation programme, three month curfew and pay £425 in costs and surcharge.

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Prosecutor Robert Lindsey told the court that police raided Smith’s home last February after a tip-off he’d been accessing indecent images of children online.

They seized an HP laptop, a black computer tower and a Samsung Galaxy mobile phone. Police experts found more than 1,000 child sex abuse images, including 149 in the most serious category showing the rape of children aged five to 16.

He also had 396 extreme pornographic images depicting sex between animals and people and 43 prohibited images of children. Many of the files were inaccessible but included both still images and videos.

Nawaz Khan, mitigating, said his client was remorseful and had undertaken courses with the Lucy Faithfull Foundation and other organisations aimed at tackling his offending behaviour.

He was said to have been struggling with his mental health at the time. Since the offences came to light, Smith’s daughter and ex-wife had cut ties with him.

'Serious mistake'

“This is a man in the latter years of his life who’s made a serious mistake in his behaviour, has lost his good character, lost his support of some members of his family who will be affected for a long time to come in the local community. It is going to have a huge effect,” his advocate said.

Smith had worked for 12 years as head coach of two tennis clubs, which were not named in court, having retrained at 50 when he was made redundant from his sales job.

As a tennis coach, he had worked with schools.

Smith, of Grove, near Wantage, pleaded guilty at the magistrates’ court to possession of indecent images, extreme pornography and a prohibited image of a child. He had no previous convictions.

He must register as a sex offender and abide by a sexual harm prevention order for 10 years.

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