Dale O’Brien had 446 sickening images

A CROUCH End man who distributed vile images of children to fellow paedophiles whilst still a teenager himself has been told he is facing a possible jail term.

Dale O’Brien, of Tottenham Lane, Crouch End – now 20 years old – was caught by police with more than 400 sickening photographs of youngsters on his computer.

When police investigated further, they examined O’Brien’s internet activities stretching back to 2008 and discovered he had been using file sharing programmes to send child pornography since the age of 18.

O’Brien appeared at Southwark Crown Court on Tuesday for a plea and case management hearing.

Standing in the dock, he entered guilty pleas to a single count of downloading indecent images of children and five counts of distributing them by using the peer-to-peer network, Limewire.

Among the 446 child pornography images police discovered had been distributed by O’Brien, 19 were in the two most serious categories. One of the images he distributed fell into the most serious category, depicting children suffering serious abuse at the hands of adults.

Judge Nicholas Loraine-Smith adjourned O’Brien’s sentencing until November 8 so that a pre-sentence report could be completed.

But he told the defendant: “I don’t know enough about you or these offences to know what the likely sentence is to be, but there are a large number of images, and all options are open to the court.”

The court heard that the distribution offences took place between May 10, 2008 and March 12 this year – this means he was 18 and 19 years old at the time he committed the offences.

During the hearing, O’Brien denied three further charges of distributing child pornography and these were left to lie on the court file.