An Australian man has been sentenced to five years in prison for downloading nearly 60,000 "depraved and disgusting" child pornography images.
Ian David Blundell, 31, downloaded 56,767 pornographic images, 1608 videos and 963 stories showing child pornography in years between 2005 and 2008. Victorian County Court judge Sue Pullen said on Monday that the pornography was of "the most depraved and disgusting kind". She observed that it was the worst kind of sexual exploitation of children as some of them were babies. "The images I viewed were distressing. It is hard to adequately describe the depravity. (There were) infants, children and teenagers publicly displayed in the most vile way", The Age quoted Judge Pullen as saying. Blundell accessed the pornography at home and locked himself in his bedroom to do so, the court was told. Blundell, who is illiterate, was caught after the police raided his home. Judge Pullen said the courts had to reflect the community's outrage at such offences in sentencing child pornography offenders.