Spennymoor paedophile shared photos of himself abusing child
Police first arrested Jackson, of Moorside, at his home on 9 October 2023 after receiving information he possessed indecent images of children, prosecutor Ellen Wright said.Several devices were seized and downloads completed, which were examined more than a year later on 11 November 2024, the court heard.
Thousands of images
Officers discovered a folder titled with a child's name, in which they found more than 600 images of a child taken without the subject's knowledge, including a number which showed Jackson molesting them.There were also images of Jackson attempting to sexually abuse a second child, as well as a hoard of more than 4,000 child sex abuse images, including almost 1,400 in the most serious category with victims as young as four, the court heard.Police also discovered more than 9,000 messages and 4,000 child sex abuse images Jackson had exchanged with another person on Telegram over a 13-month period, Ms Wright said.Jackson had also distributed 96 indecent images of children, including 17 he had made of himself abusing the child, to nine other abusers on WhatsApp and Telegram, the court heard.There were also three folders, each with a different man's name, that were found to contain more than 700 covertly recorded images of three men getting changed at a venue in County Durham, the court heard.
'Men felt violated'
On 12 November, Jackson was arrested again with more devices seized and searched, the court heard.A mobile phone was found to contain more images of indecent children he had downloaded since his first arrest, the court heard.In statements read to the court, the mother of the child Jackson molested said she was devastated to learn of the abuse, while the three men said they felt "violated" and distressed at the thought of intimate images of them being shared online.Judge Stephen Ashurst said Jackson had carried out a "variety of disturbing" and "deviant" offences and there was no question he had a sexual interest in children and got gratification from abusing them.A sexual harm prevention order restricting his future use of the internet and contact with children was also made to last indefinitely.
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Some have accused McCormack of talking Bedford down, while the county's police and crime commissioner, John Tizard, has described his project as 'political stunt' At Buckinghamshire New University in the late 1990s, he taught himself how to build a website for the publication. Then his landlord, who ran a window company, paid him £450 to create one for their business. A local recruitment business also offered him £2,000 to build its website. Within a few months, he'd abandoned his studies and moved to London, where a dotcom firm had offered him a £1,000-a-week job. In 2007, he started his own agency with a friend, titled McCormack & Morrison. It specialised in web design, social media and marketing and quickly grew to 35 staff, generating a turnover of about £3m a year. But in 2014, McCormack's marriage to the mother of his two children collapsed and following the divorce, his life went spectacularly off the rails. 'I basically got addicted to cocaine,' he says. 'I went hard. 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Ignoring doctors, who had advised him to take antidepressants, he bought some running shoes, temporarily turned vegan, quit booze and began jogging every day. While pounding the streets of Bedford, McCormack began listening to podcasts by Rich Roll, an American former drug addict- turned ultra-endurance athlete and healthy living influencer. A friendship ensued and, in 2017, he asked Roll for advice on how to start a career in podcasting. 'He basically told me, 'Pick a subject and stick with it,'' McCormack says. 'I had come across Bitcoin in the past because I'd used it to buy cocaine. I thought, 'That'll do.' So I got on a plane and flew to America to interview people in the industry.' Later that year, he launched a podcast called What Bitcoin Did. 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The brothers, who in 2004 sued their Harvard contemporary Mark Zuckerberg for stealing their idea for a social media website (he settled for $65m and actor Armie Hammer starred as the twins in the film The Social Network), have since made billion-dollar fortunes in crypto and had been meeting McCormack to discuss collaborations with his podcast. They were apparently fascinated by the concept – alien to American sport and which revolves around closed shop franchises – that a small local team could potentially be promoted to the Premier League. They agreed to pay £3.6m for a 45 per cent stake. Real Bedford has since been promoted and will start this season in English football's seventh tier. What is less clear, of course, is how deep someone's pockets need to be to sort out a town like Bedford. 'We need people to come to town, buy stuff and mooch around shops,' McCormack says. 'That starts by making them actually feel safe here' McCormack, meanwhile, describes himself as a 'budget Ryan Reynolds' after the Hollywood star who owns Wrexham AFC and whose story is the subject of hit Disney+ series Welcome To Wrexham. 'You can buy pretty much any league, depending on how deep your pockets are,' is how he puts it. What is less clear, of course, is how deep someone's pockets need to be to sort out a town like Bedford. 'We need people to come to town, buy stuff and mooch around shops,' he says. 'That starts by making them actually feel safe here. There are loads of rich people round here but, at the moment, they spend their money in London or Cambridge. 'I have this thing I tell people: that if half the people who live in town spent just a tenner a week more here, that would add up to £50m a year. 'Imagine what that could achieve. A few security guards might not instantly fix Bedford, or any other town for that matter. But it's got to be a start.
