A 59-YEAR-OLD Kingswinford grandfather who amassed a sickening hoard of nearly 14,000 indecent photographs of children as young as six has avoided jail time.

Judge Michael Challinor at Wolverhampton Crown Court ruled it was more important for George Clarke to receive treatment for his “problems” than spend a short spell behind bars.

He told Clarke: “Most people simply cannot understand why anyone should want to view this vile material.

“These children were in obvious distress and you distributed the images which makes the case far more serious.”

“My principal task is to protect the public and a modest prison sentence would not achieve that aim.”

Clarke, of The Portway, admitted six charges of making indecent images of children, three of distributing the images and another of possessing extreme pornography.

He was placed on Supervision for three years with a condition he attends the Sex Offenders Programme and he was further made the subject of an indefinite Sexual Offenders Protection Order.

Bernard Porter, defending, said Clarke, who was also ordered to register as a Sex Offender for five years, had already taken steps to address his problems by seeking support and advice.

He said he had moved onto the indecent images of children after accessing adult pornography, adding, “He now realises each photographs represents a crime scene.”

Mr Porter stressed Clarke realised the gravity of his offending and said he had not viewed any of the images since his arrest, adding: “He is already working hard to rehabilitate himself.”

Joanne Barker, prosecuting, said police went to Clarke’s home and he told the officers: “There is no point hiding it. The images are on my hard drive.”

The officers recovered a total of 13,810 images in all categories and found 49 of the moving images had been distributed to others.

Miss Barker said all the images involved female children aged from six to eight and when interviewed Clarke said he felt he had not been doing any harm and he equated his actions to “driving at 40mph in a 30mph zone”.