A Felixstowe man who uploaded and shared more than 100 indecent images of children has been given a community order.

Oliver Featherstone, of Fleetwood Road, Felixstowe, was sentenced at Ipswich Crown Court yesterday (Wednesday, July 6) after previously pleading guilty to eight charges at an earlier hearing. 

The 26-year-old admitted three charges of making indecent images of children, three counts of distributing indecent images, possessing an extreme pornographic image and attempting to incite a child to engage in sexual activity. 

The court heard how police received information regarding a Kik account after indecent images of children had been uploaded to the internet. 

Joanne Eley, prosecuting, told the court Featherstone was identified and police executed a warrant at his address on November 16, 2020,

A number of devices were seized and following analysis, 32 images of the most serious kind - category A - were discovered along with 23 movies of that grade. 

The court heard Featherstone was also found to be in possession of 28 category B images and six videos, and 76 category C images and one movie. An extreme pornographic image was also discovered along with evidence of chat sessions where images had been sent.

The age of the children in the images ranged from four to 15 years old, the court was told. 

Ms Eley outlined that the chats recovered also showed Featherstone tried to engage a 14-year-old child in sexual activity in July 2020, although the identity or age of the other user could not be verified.

Featherstone, who had no previous convictions, accepted wrongdoing and admitted he had been communicating with child protection charity the Lucy Faithfull Foundation. 

Ms Eley told the court the Covid pandemic was a particularly difficult time for him and he "went down an unpleasant path". 

Recorder Jeremy Benson QC told Featherstone he was going to take an "unusual course" and not impose a custodial sentence due to the psychological reports he had read and felt there was a "substantial" chance of rehabilitation with the right support. 

He handed Featherstone a three-year community order, with up to 35 rehabilitation activity requirement days, and a programme activity requirement. 

Featherstone must also complete 150 hours of unpaid work and pay £500 in court costs and a victim surcharge of £95.