Mark Tugwood was found with dozens of ‘hideous’ indecent pictures of children. Police officers raided Mark Tugwood’s home on Thornber Grove in Blackpool and found the images on a mobile phone and laptop.
They included girl victims aged between six and nine and the most serious showed a child being raped.
Mark Tugwood, 53, said he was unemployed at the time and his ‘mind wandered’ while searching for jobs online.
Preston Crown Court heard that the grandfather had access to Facebook ‘under different pseudonyms’ and the indecent images included six category A – the most serious – one category B and 14 category C.
Search terms were also found on his computer including ‘young girl first time sex’ and ‘teen cam girls’.
Mark Tugwood pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children.
Judge Heather Lloyd sentenced Mark Tugwood to a two-year community order with a 40-day rehabilitation activity requirement and 60 hours unpaid work.
She also told the defendant: “They are real children being hideously raped and sexually abused so men like you hiding behind their screens can derive sexual pleasure from the pain and misery they are suffering.
“I don’t understand why it is that you would not realise immediately that these were happening to real children because that’s what they are.
“I would like you to imagine how you would feel if your children or grandchildren had been subjected to the same acts in these images so somebody like you half way around the world could get sexual pleasure from it.
“Like most men who commit these types of offences you are middle aged and of previous good character.”
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