A MAN who downloaded child pornography from the Internet told police "this is what you're looking for", when two CD-roms were found in his pocket.

Alan Francis Powers was arrested by police at premises attached to a video rental shop in Whitworth Terrace, Spennymoor, County Durham, following a tip off from the US.

Durham Crown Court heard that computer equipment in a rear office was seized, and the CD-roms were found in his back pocket when he was taken to Newton Aycliffe police station.

Amanda Rippon, prosecuting, said they contained eight moving pictures of girls as young as 12 involved in indecent acts. However, they were at the lower end of the level of severity for child pornography.

More serious images, involving a girl aged about 14, were found on the computer hard drive.

Miss Rippon said an "eliminator" programme to permanently erase selected files from the computer, "appeared to have done its job".

Powers said at first that he must have downloaded the images in error, not knowing what they contained, and had not got round to eliminating them.

But he has since admitted nine counts of making an indecent image of a child.

Brian Russell, for Powers, said he only began looking at that type of material several months after the breakdown of his marriage.

Judge Tim Hewitt told him: "Had there been more images, at a higher level, or any suggestion you were distributing them, in my view a custodial sentence would have been inevitable."

Powers was given a two-year community rehabilitation order, with a requirement to attend a sex offender programme. He was also banned from possessing computer equipment and placed on the sex offenders register for five years.