FORMER Labour Bentham councillor, John Pilkington, has been jailed for 21 months after amassing a huge quantity of sickening child pornography over a seven year period. "Yours is one of the worst collections of child pornography it has been my misfortune to have to look at." said Judge Scott Wolstenholme.

At an earlier hearing, he admitted ten offences of making indecent photographs of children between July 11 1998 and November 10 2002 and two counts of possessing indecent photographs and movie clips of children on November 13 2002.

Prosecutor Jonathan Carroll told Leeds Crown Court that the images were found after police raided Pilkington's home as part of Operation Ore, a nationwide investigation into computer crime and child abuse.

Mr Carroll said Pilkington, who had served on Craven District Council, had 32,000 still and moving images of child pornography in his possession.nHe told the court Pilkington's credit card transactions showed 12 purchases relating to child pornography sites.

Police searched Pilkington's Bentham home and seized items of computer equipment and documents relating to child pornography. There were 13 hard copy printouts and 31 pages documenting child pornography images, said Mr Carroll. A handful of indecent photographs of children were also recovered.

Mr Carroll said the images covered a period from 1995 to September 2002 and of the samples examined, 10 per cent of the stills and 20 per cent of the moving images were categorised as level four.

** The scale has five levels with one being the least serious and five the most serious. **

The prosecutor said there was no evidence that the defendant distributed the images.

Pilkington told police that he had hardly ever viewed the images and had begun to monitor the material because of his concerns that it was freely available. But he accepted he had never reported his concerns to the authorities. He denied getting any sexual pleasure from looking at the images.

Richard Clews, mitigating, said Pilkington and his wife had suffered health problems. He had given great public service and publicity of his case was hard to bear, he added.

Judge Wolstenholme said he had taken into account Pilkington's health problems, but a prison sentence was inevitable. The judge said the moving images were "very disturbing and distressing films" of children being very seriously sexually abused over a period of years.

Pilkington was one of eight North Yorkshire men arrested in November 2002 as part of Operation Ore. However he was not charged until September 2003. The following day, he resigned from the council after serving as the ward representative for Bentham for nearly 20 years.

During his council service, he worked hard for the North Craven community and was a key figure on the committee responsible for bringing money into Bentham through the Market Towns Initiative. He also played a leading role in the transfer of Craven Council's housing stock into the hands of a housing association.

Pilkington was also a lay Methodist preacher in North Craven.

After the hearing, the Rev Tony Dent, superintendent minister of the Settle Methodist circuit, said he had known the former councillor since moving to the area four-and-a-half years ago. He told the media that the church had been saddened by the events surrounding his court appearance.

"John has been known to us as a conscientious lay preacher and a hard worker both in his local church and in the community. We sincerely regret that there has been this other side to his life of which we were totally unaware." adding "The Methodist church has a robust policy on the safeguarding of children from abuse following the Home Office code of practice. In accordance with that policy John was suspended from all duties at both local church and circuit level following his arrest in November 2002."

John Pilkington, 61 at the time of his trial, was told by Judge Scott Wolstenholme it was "one of the worst collections of child pornography that it has been my misfortune to have to look at".

Pilkington, 61, was also banned from working with children for life and was ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years.

A former Craven district councillor who was jailed for possessing about 30,000 indecent images of children has been back in court again for similar offending.

High Bentham man John Pilkington, 76 in 2018, was sentenced to 21 months in prison back in February 2004 after a judge described his collection of child pornography as one of the worst it had been his misfortune to look at.

But another judge heard yesterday (Thursday) that shortly after being released from that prison term he began accumulating indecent images and videos of children again.

Last month Pilkington, of Springfield, pleaded guilty to possessing almost 400 indecent images and videos of children as well as three extreme pornographic images and yesterday (Thursday) he appeared before Bradford Crown Court for his sentence.

Prosecutor Paul Nicholson told the court that Pilkington had downloaded the images and videos between April 2006 and August last year.

Police officers seized various devices from Pilkington's home and after they were analysed he was found to have downloaded dozens of videos and nearly 300 images of children. Barrister Robin Frieze conceded that his client must have started downloading the material shortly after his release from prison and the court heard that Pilkington was in denial about his offending at that time. But Mr Frieze submitted that Pilkington had now had the courage and sense to come to terms with his "deviancy" and to seek help for it.

"There is in my submission great force in the recommendation in the report that he is now somebody with some insight into the trigger factors that led him to look at this material sporadically." said Mr Frieze. He submitted that the treatment available now would give his client the tools to prevent him offending in the same way again.

Recorder Jeremy Hill-Baker said offence-focused programmes for sex offenders were effective in certain cases and he hoped that Pilkington now appreciated that downloading such images and videos was not a victimless crime.

Pilkington was sentenced to a two-year community order which includes a requirement to engage with a 90-day sex offender treatment programme.

He will also register as a sex offender with the police for the next five years and he must also comply with a sexual harm prevention order.

The judge warned Pilkington that he could spend the rest of his life in prison if he breached the terms of the community order.

A FORMER district councillor for Craven who was jailed for possessing 30,000 indecent images of children has been back in court for breaching terms of a sexual harm prevention order.

John Pilkington, 80, was originally jailed for 21 months in 2004 for the offence which the judge at the time said was one of the worst collections of child pornography it had been his misfortune to see.

Soon after his release Pilkington began accumulating videos and indecent images of children again. In 2018 Pilkington was sentenced at Bradford Crown Court to a two-year community order with a 90-day sex offender treatment programme after admitting possessing a further 400 images including extreme pornographic material. He also had to register as a sex offender for the following five years and must also comply with a sexual harm prevention order.

But the pensioner, of Springfield, High Bentham, has appeared in court again and before Skipton magistrates on Friday admitted breaching the sexual harm prevention order on May 25, 2022, when he deleted internet history from his laptop, and on June 7, 2022, also at Springfield, where he had a device, a ScanDisk USB PenDrive, capable of storing digital images, without notifying the police within three days of aquisition.

Prosecuting, Nadine Clough said the details of his sexual harm prevention order require police to examine his laptop reqularly and on May 25 last year officers were made aware that some software was being used and porn sites being browsed. Officers also suspected that he had been deleting items. On June 2022 police were shown the PenDrive device.

She added that the defendant was frail and was struggling with short-term memory loss.

John Mewies, mitigating, said it was a very sad case. He said the defendant, a retired systems analyist, led a lonely, isolated existence and looked after his wife's medical needs. "He does not drive, his groceries are delivered and he is trapped in his home."

Mr Mewies said he accepted he had breached the original order twice since 2004 but had been compliant with the police.

"He has simply succumbed to temptation. He thinks he is someone else when he is viewing material. It is suggested he has forgotten the terms of the prevention order and there is a lack of attention to what he should not be doing." Mr Mewies said.

Magistrates accepted the order was put in place some time ago but said breaching a court order was a serious offence. They fined Pilkington £192 with a surcharge of £34 and costs of £85.