Dad ‘screwed up’ and downloaded 6,000 images of child sex abuse

A father downloaded thousands of sick child sex images and hid them on laptops and hard drives in his family home.

Martin Mannion, of Springhill Court, Wavertree, amassed his ‘cataloged library of images’ between November 2022 and March 2023. He was caught when police carried out an investigation into those using file-sharing software to make and distribute images of child sexual abuse. An IP address, which was used to access a folder containing 4,461 indecent images of children, was traced to a Virgin Media account belonging to Mannion, 61.

Officers went to Mannion’s home shortly after 9 a.m. on June 29, 2023, while his 11-year-old son was at school. They seized two laptops and two external hard drives containing thousands of child pornography.

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In total, officers found 28 images and 30 videos of the most serious category A, four images and six videos of category B and 6,004 images and 54 videos of category C. The images were held in a number of files from each of his devices, including one marked with his initials and another called “photos to keep.”

Mannion pleaded guilty to possessing 6,058 indecent images of children and three counts of making indecent images of children (categories A, B and C). He appeared at Liverpool Crown Court today, May 10, for sentencing.

Christopher Taylor, prosecuting, said: “The content of these videos is unfortunately typical of the type of abuse that this court sees. In each of these videos, in each of these images, there is an abused child somewhere in the world. In terms of impact on victims, it is a global trade.”

Trevor Parry-Jones, defending, said: “The period between his arrest and afterwards was extremely serious for him and very difficult. Of course, it’s not just difficult for him, but for his immediate family and his son. His wish, his hope is that he will soon be able to regain the trust of his family, especially his wife and son.”

He added: “After working 40 years of work for his family, for his son and his wife, then he went out of his mind and one can only look at his personal circumstances to see perhaps an explanation, a understanding that something has changed for him. .

“This is a man crying out for help. He needs her. He lost his job as a result of his arrest and many would say he should. It had an effect on his wife and son. He won two alternative jobs. and lost them again due to the proceedings’. He said Mannion, who has no previous convictions, had to rely on his brother for financial support as a result.

Judge Mark Ainsworth said: “We must emphasize that this is not a victimless murder. Far from it. Behind every photo is a sexually abused child. We may never know who they are, we may never know where they are, but the images show that children are being sexually abused and obviously it is a matter that the public and indeed the courts find it abhorrent, and rightly so, the assumption must be made that if it weren’t for people like you, there would be no market for these images.”

He sentenced Mannion to a total of 10 months in prison, suspended for 18 months. He also ordered him to complete two rehabilitation courses and 160 hours of unpaid work and issued a sexual harm prevention order (SHPO) for 10 years.