A CONVICTED sex offender was caught with a stash of sickening child porn just a week after being allowed back on the streets.
Alan Hawkins was released from a five-year jail term imposed in 2008 for distributing images of children to like-minded perverts on January 10 last year.
Newastle Crown Court heard just seven days later, staff at the hostel he was staying at in Sunderland found a mobile phone in his room, containing 18 images of youngsters being abused.
Hawkins pleaded guilty to three charges of making indecent photographs of children and one of possessing indence photographs of children.
Judge James Goss QC jailed him for three years.
The judge told him: “You have been assessed as someone who is not suitable for any form of order other than a sentence of imprisonment.
“The seriousness of these offences and the circumstances in which they have been committed make a prison sentence inevitable.”
Judge Goss said Hawkins must abide by a Sexual Offences Prevention Order which limits his telephone and computer use and restricts his contact with children for life.
He must also sign the sex offenders’ register for life.
Judge Goss added: “This is in order to protect the public, in particularly children, from the commission of further offences by you.”
The court heard Hawkins was jailed for 18 months in 1997 for indecently assaulting a schoolgirl.
In 2008 he received the five-year prison term.
Prosecutor Michael Bunch told the court: “The defendant was released from custody on January 10, 2012
“A condition of his licence was he could possess only one mobile phone or Sim card, and that mobile phone must not have the capacity of taking photographs.
“A routine search of his room conducted on January 17, 2012, revealed a mobile phone.”
The court heard the first mobile phone found in the search abided by the rules of being unable to take or store photographs.
But Hawkins then volunteered the fact he had a second phone in his room.
Mr Bunch said: “It was removed from a hidden location in his bedding. It was a phone which did have a camera.
“Members of staff checked the contents of the phone and discovered the images.”
The court heard Hawkins told police in interview the phone was not his.
Peter Schofield, defending, said Hawkins feels he would benefit from sex offender treatment.