Preston judge spares paedophile jail after 150 abuse images found hidden under pensioner's mattress
A paedophile pensioner who stored child pornography on phones hidden under the mattress of his bed has been spared immediate prison by a judge in Preston.
Mushtaq Ahmed was found with more than 150 photographs and videos – a third of them classed as “extreme pornography” involving kids as young as three - on three mobiles at his home.
But the court heard the 66-year-old was still adamant he had no sexual interest in children, despite the search history on his devices showing he had been looking for content tagged “young” and “teen”.
Ahmed was given a suspended prison sentence after pleading guilty to four charges of possessing 49 extreme porn images, 36 category A, 26 category B and 46 category C pictures.
His defence barrister admitted during the hearing that his client still maintained he was not attracted to children.
“It has to be recognised there is still work to be done with this defendant (because) whether it’s through shame, he has maintained he has no sexual interest in children,” said Kristian Cavanagh.
The court was told police were alerted after Ahmed uploaded indecent images of children on Facebook.
Officers visited his home in Burnley Road, Rawtenstall and initially Ahmed would not let them in. When they did get access they examined his Samsung mobile phone and found a number of sexual images of children.
He told them: “People send them to me. I don’t know how to delete them.”
Two further mobiles, both Apple iPhones, were discovered under the mattress of his bed. Across all three phones they discovered a total of 108 images of children, some of them stills and some moving. They also found 49 more which were considered to be extreme pornography. The images had all been loaded over almost four years from August 2020 to May 2024.
Barrister Sam Eskdale, prosecuting, said various types of software had been used to hide some of the material. Ahmed’s collection of images and film contained “young and vulnerable” children.
When interviewed by police Ahmed gave “no comment” answers to all questions.
Mr Cavanagh, for Ahmed, said it was agreed the custody threshold had been passed in this case due to the number and categories of the images in his possession.
He said his client had no previous convictions and had entered a guilty plea at the first opportunity.
Two of Ahmed’s four children were in court to support their father and, said Mr Cavanagh, they had pledged to make sure he complies with any order handed down by the court.
“He is genuine in his remorse. There is work clearly that must be done with him. He has not reoffended since the police came to him in 2024.”
He asked Judge Ian Unsworth to consider suspending any prison sentence he imposed.
The judge told Ahmed: “These images were of mainly young children being sexually abused. You may not have had any actual contact with the children in the images, but they are someone’s son or someone’s daughter with the rest of their young lives ahead of them.
“Despite your protest that you are not interested in children, which is not uncommon in these cases, I am satisfied that you did obtain gratification from viewing these images.
“There is no doubt that it is obvious and would have been obvious to you at the time that some of these young children were very young indeed, the lower end of something in the region of three to five years old.
“Your search history suggests you were deliberately looking for images of young people and teenagers. You had applied software in an attempt to avoid detection.”
The judge gave Ahmed a total of 20 months in prison suspended for 18 months. He also put him on the Sex Offenders Register for 10 years meaning he will have to notify police of any change of address or circumstances.
And he told him: “I am satisfied that the circumstances of this case are such that it is necessary for me to impose a Sexual Harm Prevention Order for 10 years. This will ensure that you are severely restricted in your ability to use the internet and your use of devices.”
Judge Unsworth also told him he will have to complete 30 rehabilitation activity days over the period of his sentence.