A RECLUSE whose "curiosity" led to him searching for under-age pornography on the internet, was today jailed for three months.

Darren Anthony Shotton, 36, who was said to have a penchant for pre and early teenage sexual images, went to great lengths to conceal illicit material he had downloaded.

But after a raid at his home, in Holmeside Avenue, Lanchester, County Durham, his computer equipment was seized and removed for examination.

Durham Crown Court heard that experts eventually uncovered more than 30,000 images stored on a hard drive and a storage drive, but only after surpassing privacy blocks.

Lesley Kirkup, prosecuting, said when questioned by police in April Shotton claimed he thought the images were "legal".

Later in the month he was further interviewed and accepted downloading the images, having sought "teen" material, but not intending further distribution on the internet.

Miss Kirkup said Shotton revealed most images came from a site named ‘Forbidden Realms’ and were considered to be in the illegal pre-teen category.

They were classified as 29,406 in level one, the least serious of the five categories for child pornography, 36 at level two, and eight at level three.

Two of the offending items were said to be movie clips rather than still images.

Shotton admitted 15 counts of downloading indecent images of children and a single "roll up" charge of possession of such material.

Joe Hedworth, for Shotton, told the court none of the images was above level three, while his client had made early admissions over the rest of the material.

"The background is that he was initially accessing legal adult pornography, but curiosity got the better of him and he began to access illegal material.

"He’s completely ashamed and utterly embarrassed and realises he needs special intervention to prevent the risk of him appearing before the court in future.

"He leads a truly lonely and miserable existence with very little social interaction with others over the years.

"He’s become more and more reclusive, sinking further into depression."

Jailing him, Judge Christopher Prince told Shotton the children featuring in the offending material could not be considered any older than 12 or 13.

"Given that these children were so far below the age of 16 it puts it into a category where an immediate prison sentence is inevitable."

Shotton must also sign the Sex Offenders’ Register for seven years.