A PAEDOPHILE has narrowly avoided prison after he was caught looking at child abuse images of children as young as three.

Dylan Tayler was sentenced last April to 10 months, suspended for two years, for three offences of making indecent images of children.

As a result, he had to sign the sex offenders register and was made the subject of a sexual harm prevention order which required him to have monitoring software installed on his devices.

On January 12, the e-safe software flagged up to police there had been some “concerning searches” the previous day on Tayler’s computer, prosecutor Dyfed Thomas said.

Officers found “several concerning images” when they checked the software. On January 18, they received a further alert from the monitoring software.

Officers attended his address and searched his devices. Tayler was found to have searched for ‘teens masturbating’ as well as multiple pornography websites.

He was also found to have searched for the terms “very young”, “teen”, and “hairless”.

The officers also found indecent images of children on the computer – six of Category A – the most serious, three of Category B, and 19 of Category C.

Mr Thomas said the youngest child in the images was believed to be between three and five years old.

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Tayler was arrested, and initially told officers in his interview that he inadvertently opened one image of a child, which he closed immediately and then shut his computer down.

The 20-year-old, of Penbanc in Fishguard, has one previous conviction for three offences. He later pleaded guilty to three offences of making indecent images of children.

Hannah George, in mitigation, said: “The defendant appreciates that he is a very perilous position.”

Ms George told the court that Tayler had been ordered to complete the Horizon programme – which is designed to help prevent sex offenders from reoffending – when he was previously before the court.

“Through no fault of his own, he has been unable to complete the Horizon programme,” she said. 

“Because of a lack of availability, other people whose risk was greater were prioritised.”

She asked the court to hold back from sending Tayler to prison as he had now been allocated a place on the programme.

“He’s eager to complete the Horizon programme because he doesn’t want to look at these images,” Ms George said.

Sentencing Tayler, Recorder Christopher Felstead said: “You are back here again on the same sorts of charges.

“They are plainly very serious matters indeed.

“Ordinarily there would be absolutely no chance whatsoever I would suspend a sentence where you have done the same thing yet again.

“I accept, through no fault of yours, you have not yet attended the Horizon programme.”

Recorder Felstead sentenced Tayler to a total of nine months, suspended for two years. He must complete 150 hours of unpaid work and 25 rehabilitation activity requirement days for the indecent images offences, as well as a further 100 hours of unpaid work for breaching his suspended sentence.

“I very much hope that will enable you to complete the Horizon programme. I very much hope you will not prove me wrong,” he said.

Tayler remains subject to his previous sexual harm prevention order, and must re-sign the sex offenders register for 10 years.