A HEALTH trust has applied to have a family doctor blacklisted from working with the NHS nationwide after he was jailed for child pornography.

Dr Riccardo Benci, a GP with Sedgefield Primary Care Trust (PCT), in County Durham, was sentenced to 15 months in jail in January, after he downloaded images of children being abused.

The doctor was automatically removed from the trust's medical performers' list, to prevent him from working in the trust area, and he was suspended by the General Medical Council (GMC).

Sedgefield PCT has now applied to the Family Health Services Appeals Authority to disqualify the GP from working for the NHS anywhere in the country.

The tribunal group, which is independent from the Department of Health, will meet in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, on June 1 to discuss if Benci should be disqualified nationally.

This would prevent him from applying to be put on the medical performers' lists at other PCTs throughout the country.

Benci will be eligible to be released from prison on licence in July.

The GMC last night said it had not yet held a fitness to practice hearing to discuss his future.

Benci, of Staindrop Crescent, Darlington, was found with sadomasochistic images of boys as young as six on his home computer.

He had been given a formal warning by the PCT at a disciplinary hearing in May 2004 after adult pornography was discovered on his computer at the Jubilee Medical Group practice, in Newton Aycliffe, County Durham. He was later found with child pornography on his home computer after he took it into a Darlington shop for repairs and staff alerted police.

Benci had been a doctor in Italy for 14 years before he came to England and joined Sedgefield PCT in August 2003.

He worked at a number of practices in the area before he was employed as a doctor at the Newton Aycliffe practice.