A PAEDOPHILE was caught with a sickening hoard of the worst level of child pornography after a police cybercrime team swooped on his bedroom shortly after dawn.

Depraved James McNeil buried his head in his hands and confessed to his mother after she asked him if the raid had anything to do with him, Greenock Sheriff Court was told.

The 27-year-old pervert had downloaded hundreds of disgusting videos and pictures of girls aged as young as two being abused by men during periods spanning more than seven years.

McNeil, of Larkfield, hoarded nearly 200 individual items of horrific category A child abuse on a tower computer that he kept in a storage cupboard.

He sat with his head bowed as the scale of his offending was narrated by procurator fiscal depute Pamela Brady, who told how he had further catalogues of category B and C images — all showing exploited young girls.

Mrs Brady told the court how McNeil had been asleep when police, armed with a search warrant, raided his mother’s home shortly before 8am on March 31 last year — then woke and admitted his guilt.

The prosecutor said: “Police were made aware of information indicating that indecent images of children were available to an IP address connected to subscriber details at an address in Greenock.

“A search warrant was sought and granted at Greenock Sheriff Court on March 30 and at 7.50am on March 31 a number of police officers attended at the house.

“The door was answered by the accused’s stepfather, police were allowed entry and officers spoke with the accused’s mother.

“They thereafter found the accused asleep in his bedroom.

“It was explained to all parties why the police were present.

“The accused’s mother stated to the accused, ‘Is this anything to do with you?’

“The accused replied, ‘It’s me — I’m sorry’ and then buried his head in his hands.”

The court was told how a ‘number’ of electronic devices were seized from McNeil’s bedroom, including the tower computer, an HP laptop and a hard drive that was sitting behind a TV unit.

Mrs Brady said: “The cybercrime unit carried out an initial analysis of the tower system and it was immediately apparent that indecent images of children were contained on the device.

“The accused was detained and taken to Greenock police office, where he consulted with a solicitor.

“An interview was carried out in the presence of the solicitor and the accused answered ‘no comment’ to all questions put to him by the police.

“He appeared at Greenock Sheriff Court and thereafter a full examination of the devices was carried out by the cybercrime unit and a disc of the images found was produced.

“There were 330 images in total, made up of 150 still images and 180 moving images.” 

McNeil had a total of 193 category A images, which are defined in law as the worst and most sexually explicit images, the court heard. There were 136 category A videos and 57 category A images.

Mrs Brady told how one of the videos showed a three-year-old girl being abused and a still image displayed the exploitation of a four-year-old.

She said: “All of the images featured females aged between two and 14 years.”

McNeil pleaded guilty through lawyer Ellen Macdonald to taking or permitting to be taken or making indecent photographs or pseudo photographs of children between May 30 2008 and December 14 2011, inclusive, and between March 16 and November 11 2015.

His not guilty plea to a charge of having in his possession indecent photos or pseudo photos of children between February 1 2008 and March 31 2016 was accepted by the Crown.

Sheriff Derek Hamilton said: “I will continue bail at this stage but Mr McNeil should be in no doubt about the seriousness of this matter and the sentencing guidelines laid down by the High Court.”

The sheriff deferred sentence for background and psychological reports until April 5 and immediately placed McNeil on the Sex Offenders Register.

Solicitor Ms Macdonald reserved her plea in mitigation on behalf of McNeil until his sentencing hearing.