A PAEDOPHILE who admitted having more than 1,000 extreme pornographic images featuring children and animals has been spared jail.

Andrew Leigh, 22, of Goshawk Drive, Galleywood, was handed a two year sentence suspended for two years at Chelmsford Crown Court on Thursday.

Judge Anthony Goldstaub QC also gave Leigh a £585 fine along with putting him on the sex offenders list for 10 years and made him the subject of a supervision order for two years.

Leigh must attend an Internet Sexual Offenders Treatment programme and a sexual offenders prevention order was also placed on Leigh for an indefinite period.

On March 18, Leigh pleaded guilty at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court to 14 separate charges of making and distributing sexual material, a lot of which was described as “extreme” by the authorities.

Officers from Essex Police found the articles after conducting a raid at Leigh’s home on June 20 last year with the amount of confiscated images and films totalling to 1,223.

These varied between images of girls aged around six or seven-years-old while others featured animals.

When he was interviewed by police, the defendant admitted he had exchanged the material via an online file sharing website.

Leigh was also told to pay costs of £500 and a surcharge of £15 by Judge Goldstaub at the hearing.