A man expressed disbelief after police found illegal images during a raid at his home, claiming it was all a misunderstanding
St Helens: So, there’s this guy named James Bergin who was living a pretty lonely life. He got caught with a whopping 666 illegal items on his phone. Yikes!
During a court session, it came out that he had been collecting a bunch of indecent images of kids. He got sucked into some online chatrooms and ended up in a really dark place.
The police raided his home back in January 2023 after they got a tip-off about his online activity. They found all those illegal images on his Samsung phone. Talk about a wake-up call!
The prosecutor laid it all out, saying some of the images were really disturbing. James had no prior convictions, but he was still in deep trouble.
He admitted to downloading some of this awful stuff from X, which used to be Twitter. When the cops interviewed him, he insisted it was “all a big mistake.”
His lawyer mentioned that he realized he had been living too much in isolation online. After two years of thinking about his actions, he showed some remorse and wanted to change.
In the end, he pleaded guilty to several charges and got an eight-month prison sentence, but it was suspended for two years. Plus, he has to follow a sexual harm prevention order for ten years.
The judge noted that he had no previous run-ins with the law and had managed to stay out of trouble for two years. So, he got a bit of a break this time.
