A MAN has pleaded guilty to producing, sharing and selling sexual images and videos of children through the Skype communications app.
The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, admitted several charges of producing and possessing the explicit and illegal material.
The 57-year old defendant appeared before a court in Limerick on Monday.
At the arraignment hearing the man pleaded guilty to four counts of knowingly possessing child pornography, contrary to the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act, 1998”.
The material was found on a Dell Inspiron laptop, Medion laptop, Toshiba laptop, and a desktop tower, all owned by the defendant, when Gardai conducted a search of his home on May 20, 2016.
The man also admitted a charge of “production of child pornography contrary to the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act between March 18, 2016 and May 20, 2016”.
This charge read that the man “did through Skype communications, knowingly produce child pornography for the purpose of distribution, publication, exportation, sale or show”.
The man’s barrister said the amount of sexual images of children discovered by Gardai were not considerable and that all of the material before the court was found during the same search of the house and not on different dates.
The barrister asked the court to make an order prohibiting the publication of the man’s identity “as it could lead to the identification of another party”.
The barrister said it was open to the court to review the publication ban at the man’s sentencing hearing.
The court made an order prohibiting the publication of the identifies of any parties involved in the case.
The presiding judge also ordered a pre-sentencing psychological report and remanded the defendant on bail for sentencing on April 26.
