A MUSSELBURGH man who was caught with hundreds of images of child abuse, including movies of babies being sexually abused, has been banned from having any contact with children.

Connor White downloaded the haul of images, along with films of extreme pornography showing adults engaged in sexual activity with dogs and horses, over a 12-month period.

White stored the collection on his mobile phone and, when confronted by police, he begged the officers not to tell his family what he had been doing.

The 23-year-old pleaded guilty to possessing the indecent images of children when he appeared at Edinburgh Sheriff Court in May.

He was then arrested for a second time in June when officers attended at his home to check his electronic devices and found that he had breached bail conditions by deleting his internet search history.

White, of Old Course Gate, Musselburgh, was back in the dock for sentencing on Thursday, where a sheriff said he had “just been persuaded” not to impose a custodial sentence.

Electronically tagged

Instead Sheriff Chris Dickson placed White on the sex offenders' register and on a supervision order for the next three years.

He will also be electronically tagged and must stay within his home between the hours of 8pm and 5am for the next 180 days.

The sheriff also issued a series of conduct requirements, including banning White from having any contact with anyone under the age of 17 and he must allow the authorities to inspect any device capable of connecting to the internet.

White was also ordered to carry out 300 hours of unpaid work and will have his name forwarded to Scottish Ministers to be added to the list of those banned from working with children or vulnerable adults.

Previously, the court heard that police raided White’s home after receiving intelligence that child abuse images were being downloaded there on June 21 last year.

White was at home with his mother and brother and he soon asked to speak to the officers in private.

Category A

He admitted his phone “has stuff on there” that he claimed had been sent to him on the Kik app and begged the officers to “not tell them”, indicating that he was referring to his family members.

Fiscal depute Susan Dickson said that his mobile phone was seized and was found to contain material including videos of children, including babies being raped by adults.

Ms Dickson said that there were a total of 851 images found, with 624 rated at Category A – the worst end of the spectrum.

A further 260 child abuse videos were discovered, along with 427 videos of extreme pornography which were said to depict “adult men involved with dogs, horses and other farm animals”.

Sheriff Dickson deferred sentence on the bail breach and ordered White to return to court for a review in September.

White pleaded guilty to possessing indecent images of children and extreme pornography depicting sex between adults and animals between June 15, 2020, and June 21 last year.

He also admitted a charge of deleting the internet search history from his mobile phone on June 14 this year.