A self-confessed swinger who asked online naturists to send him photographs of their children has been jailed for downloading indecent images of kids as young as four.

Christopher Waters told police many of the people he met through a website called Fab Swingers were interested in nudism and he would ask if their children joined in.

“If they did, he asked them to send him photographs of the children,” prosecutor Simon Sandford told Maidstone Crown Court.

Waters, 59, was arrested in March last year after his lodger spotted such messages on his computer, which was not password locked, asking women on a swinging site if they abused their children.

She then found images depicting girls aged between 10 and 14 in explicit poses and being sexually abused.

Mr Sandford said police were alerted and other still images and movie clips showing semi-naked girls aged four to seven were discovered on the computer, as well as prohibited and extreme pornographic images.

One of the movie clips showing a seven-year-old girl being abused was three-and-a-half minutes long. Another was shared online.

The prohibited images were drawings of sexual activities taking place between adults and children, and extreme pornography involving a horse.

Search terms used on the computer included "family nudist fun" and references to incest.
None of the images found, however, were said to be of victims related to or known by Waters.

Jailing Waters for 16 months, Judge Charles Macdonald QC described him as a dangerous man with no real remorse.

Waters,formerly of Chapel Wood, New Ash Green, admitted four offences of possessing indecent photos of a child, one of possessing prohibited images of children, one of distributing indecent images of a child and one of possessing an extreme pornographic image.

The images of children were categorised by police as covering all three levels of seriousness.
Mr Sandford told the court Waters denied having a sexual interest in children, despite admitting to performing sex acts with the images or asking naturists for photos of their youngsters.

Gordon Carse, defending, said Waters accepted he had a “distorted view of things” but had sought help through the Masons by engaging with a psychologist.

He added that prison would have a significant impact on Waters’ poor health, which includes diabetes and a degenerative spinal disease.

Judge Macdonald ordered that at the end of the 16-month sentence, of which Waters will serve half behind bars and the rest on licence, he should be subject to a further four months’ supervision.

He must also sign on the sex offenders’ register for 10 years and be subject to a sexual harm prevention order which imposes conditions on his use of the internet.