(Image: West Yorkshire Police)
A court has heard how a persistent sexual deviant caught with hundreds of thousands of indecent images of children set up multiple cameras to film a young girl.
Predatory Richard Pooley also tried, but failed, to make upskirting videos of schoolgirls whilst on a bus.
Today (AUG 20) he was jailed for a total of three years and ten months after a judge described him as being at high risk of re-offending and a high risk of harm.
He must also register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
Mrs Recorder Geraldine Kelly KC described the vast amounts of videos and pictures that Pooley was charged with as “thoroughly vile” and that they represented “the tip of the iceberg” when it came to his overall behaviour.
Pooley, 61, formerly of North Dean Avenue, Keighley, was arrested last November after police received information that his IP address had uploaded indecent material to the internet.
Prosecutor Elizabeth Noble told the court that officers who raided his home found several devices including a pen camera, several laptops, a phone, a small camera, a USB stick, and several external hard drives.
They also seized a small sex doll that resembled a child.
On the camera pen were three recordings of indecent media.
Analysis of the devices revealed 768,064 images, of which 279,742 were graded.
Of these images 86,357 were in categories A, B, and C with Category A being the most serious, of which there were 7,309.
There were also 1,453 prohibited images of children, and 169 extreme pornographic images some of which involved animals.
The investigation also found 24 video recordings of children on a bus and 219 screenshots of children in school uniform.
Some of those images represented an attempt to record under clothing.
Pooley had also been using file-sharing software with keywords indicating a sexual interest in children.
In an interview with police, Pooley admitted setting up multiple cameras to make recordings of a child and that he would masturbate to the videos he had captured.
He admitted having a sexual interest in children.
The court heard that Pooley, a joiner, had no previous convictions.
He pleaded guilty to voyeurism, attempting to record under clothing, three offences of making indecent images of children, possessing extreme pornographic images, and possessing prohibited images of children.
Mitigating, Andrew Walker said Pooley had admitted his wrongdoing, which he described as “a catalogue of serious offences” that had completely shocked those that knew him.
He said Pooley’s family was divided over the shocking revelations given that he had been perceived as a gentle, hard-working family man.
He said: “There was another side to him, albeit on the exterior”, and added: “He doesn’t know how he got himself involved with this. He knows he should have looked away but he didn’t.”
He said the offending had cost Pooley – who he described as socially isolated and “a hoarder” – his job, his home “and most of his family”.
He said Pooley, who appeared in court via video link from HMP Leeds, had served the equivalent of a 23-month prison sentence and that his “day of reckoning” came when he was arrested.
Sentencing Pooley, Recorder Kelly said people were shocked at his offending “because you are only ever going to mask that sexually deviant side of yourself.”
She said his decade-long offending showed he had “carried out activities in order to seek sexual gratification for the sexual interests that you have in children.”
Of Pooley’s attempts to film upskirting videos of schoolgirls on a bus, she added: “Luckily for those young girls, you didn’t get as far as [that].
“How horrified they would have been should they realise you had done that.
“But how horrified they would be anyway if they realised that the man on the bus, just holding a pen and looking innocent, was actually sitting there and preying on them, waiting for an opportunity to record up their skirts.”
As well as registering as a sex offender for life Pooley will be subject to a Sexual Harm Prevention Order for the next ten years.
His name will also be added to a list barring him from working with vulnerable adults or children.
Recorder Kelly ordered the forfeiture and destruction of Pooley’s devices.
PC William Metcalf from the Bradford District’s Online Child Abuse Investigation Team said: “This is one of the worst cases of indecent images of children I have ever seen in my career.
“Pooley is a dangerous online sexual predator who had the most disturbing child abuse material in his possession.
“In every picture there is a victim of child abuse. We are committed as a force to protect victims of child abuse and will do everything we can to get justice for them.”
For more information about West Yorkshire Police’s Indecent Images of Children campaign, visit: www.westyorkshire.police.uk/iioc