A PAEDOPHILE was caught with indecent images of children after he asked a police officer to help him set up his web cam.

Paul Richardson, of Medina Way, Bicester, was jailed for 10 months after he admitted making and possessing about 200 of the illegal pictures.

Prosecutor Sarita Basra said the 69-year-old was previously handed a nine-year sentence for 16 sexual offences on January 5, 2006.

She told Judge Zoe Smith that Richardson told police he found the indecent images accidentally while searching for Disney films on the internet.

Miss Basra said they were discovered by an officer making a routine visit to check his computer as part of the requirements of his previous convictions.

The barrister said the defendant asked if he could help him attach a web cam to his desktop computer.

Miss Basra said it was while doing this that the officer saw he had been searching for “naked girl with 14-year-old sister”.

In total there were 213 images featuring children as young as seven found on a desktop computer, a laptop and burned onto 19 disks, she said.

Mark Dixon, defending, said his client had made full admissions of his crimes to police officers during his interview.

He added that Richardson, who used to be an engineer for car company Porsche, saw his life came “grinding to a halt” in 2006.

Judge Smith told the defendant that the images he had downloaded were “appalling”.

She added that in her view the higher level images amounted to no less than “torture” of children.

Richardson was sentenced to 10 months in prison and made subject to a sex offenders’ prevention order.

He will also have to pay a £100 victims’ surcharge.

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