"Deeply ashamed" retired civil servant caught with thousands of child abuse images

A retired civil servant was caught with thousands of child abuse images when police raided his home.

Officers seized Robert Bullock's computer devices in March 2021 and found over 11,000 illegal pictures and videos downloaded onto them.

Prosecutor Paul Cross told Newcastle Crown Court: "The children appeared to be aged between five and 15. Some were in physical pain and distress."

Bullock, 75, of Cleaside Avenue, South Shields, South Tyneside, admitted three charges of making indecent images of children.

The court heard 131 of the images were of Category A, which is the most serious type, 51 were category B and over 11,000 were category C.

Mr Recorder David Gordon told Bullock: "It is sometimes said offending of this sort is offending without a victim. This is entirely untrue.

"All of those children, in all of those images, will have experienced significant physical, psychological and sexual harm as a result of their experiences.

"The impact of being sexually abused is likely to be serious and lifelong.

"If it were not for those, those people such as yourself, with an appetite for such images and prepared to download them on the internet, perhaps those who abuse the children and take the images of the children being abused would be less inclined to do so, bearing in mind their motivation often has a commercial element.

"This is serious offending involving sexual abuse of children."

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Recorder Gordon said he had read references which spoke in the "highest terms" about Bullock, who has no previous convictions and he accepted had shown genuine remorse.

Bullock was sentenced to 10 months, suspended for two years, with rehabilitation requirements.

Recorder Gordon told him: "You have come very close to going to prison but I don't think that is in the interests of justice and there are better ways of dealing with you."

Bullock was ordered to sign the sex offenders register and abide by a sexual harm prevention order for ten years.

Brian Hegarty, defending, said Bullock had a successful career in the civil service before he took early retirement and added: "He was a man of leisure, assisting in community events, leading a normal life in retirement."

Mr Hegarty said Bullock's "world fell in" when the police went to his door but he has since referred himself to a psychotherapist.

He added: "The defendant was deeply ashamed of himself and told the police he was deeply ashamed of himself."