An engineer from Kingsteignton who used his computer skills to seek out vile images of babies being abused has been sent on a sex offender’s treatment course.

Daryl Hall thought he had hidden his online identity because he used a dark web portal named Tor to access a file sharing site but police computer experts managed to trace him.

He was found with more than 10,000 images on his computers when officers raided his bungalow at Kingsteignton.

He had deleted most of the images but the high tech crime unit found he had accessed 35 movies and 1,111 still images which came into the most extreme category.

They showed images of children as young as one suffering extreme abuse or rape, Exeter Crown Court was told.

Hall, of Rydon Estate, Kingsteignton, admitted seven offences of making indecent images of children and was jailed for 16 months, suspended for two years, and ordered to attend an internet sex offenders treatment course as part of two years’ supervision.

Judge Erik Salomonsen also ordered him to sign on the sex offenders’ register and imposed a sexual harm prevention order which will allow the police to monitor his internet use for ten years.

He told him he was suspending the sentence so he could undertake the treatment course and because Hall has already signed up with the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, which helps offenders overcome their addiction to abuse images.

The Judge told Hall: "These were abhorrent images of very young children which you had been accessing for more than four years.

"The aggravating factors are the high volume of images, the ages of the children and the fact that you searched for them deliberately and systematically.

"These are not victimless crimes. The fact that images that many people viewed these images on peer to peer software does not diminish the criminality at all."

Gareth Evans, prosecuting, said Hall was traced through his use of a peer-to-peer website where like minded people shared images of children.

His IP address was traced and his home was raided in November 2014. Police found a total of 10,520 images and movies and searches for terms including ’pre-teen hardcore’.

Hall was found to have been using the Tor network, which he believed would hide his identity, and told a probation officer he was aware of the technology because of his job as an engineer.

Emmi Wilson, mitigating, said Hall started looking at the images out of curiosity because his brother was jailed for similar offences.

He became addicted to the activity because he was living an isolated and lonely existence and now accepts he needs help. He has already sought it from the Lucy Faithfull Foundation and is keen to work with probation officer.