A man who worked with children has been given a suspended jail sentence for possessing and distributing child porn images.

Investigators found nearly 200 indecent images on computers, including some at the most serious levels four and five.

Sentencing Peter Bridle to 12 months’ imprisonment suspended for two years, Judge Colin Burn said the images were obscene, pornographic or paedophilic. He said: “They are illegal. They are offensive. And regardless of how many are distributed, regardless as to how graphic they actually are, the reality is that when these images depict real children, they are real children who are really being abused and are really having their lives ruined.

“That is happening to them for the gratification of people like you. And that is why the possession and distribution of them is so serious.

“As long as there is a market for those images, those wretched children will continue to be horribly abused around the world.”

Bridle, 50, of Aireside, Cononley , near Skipton , had previously pleaded guilty to ten offences of distributing an indecent photograph of a child and 11 of making such a photo.

Prosecutor Rupert Doswell told Bradford Crown Court yesterday that police questioned Bridle after a warrant was executed at the home of another man who had been distributing indecent images of children and there was found to have been contact between them.

His barrister, Kitty Taylor, said he had worked with children but had not committed any contact offences. There were only four images of a more serious nature.

Mrs Taylor said: “He has been living a life which is utterly exemplary, within his family, within his community, and within the job he held.”

Judge Burn said the defendant was not a serial sex offender and was not unique, as someone of middle age and good character, to be guilty of such offences. He said the best way to protect the public from any re-offending was for Bridle to take part in an accredited sex offender programme and he was suspending the prison sentence for that purpose.

Bridle will also be supervised by probation for two years and have to carry out 200 hours of unpaid community work. He was also made subject of a Sexual Offences Prevention Order.