Appeal destruction of device
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Hello everyone,
I wonder if anyone has had a similar situation and might give advice.
My person was arrested for sexual communication (vigilante group). He stayed in a hotel for work the day he was arrested. All devices he had with him were taken (2 Laptops, 2 phones). After being remanded for 7 weeks he had sentencing and got a suspended sentence. Now the OIC contacted us to ask when we would pick up everything and that "most" of the items would be returned. Turns out his private phone they do not want to hand out but destroy it.
Checked with the solicitor that we had for the case and he wrote an email to the OIC saying that no charges were brought in respect of indecent images of children. No
reference was made to any images contained thereon within the course of
the proceedings and no forfeiture and destruction order was made by the
court. Hence telling police to return the device.
The OIC replied that indecent images where found but "due to short time" before sentencing they decided to not press charges as that was seen disproportionate.
The are talking about:
<30 indicative images
<10 category 4 images
<10 category 'C' images (yes, they put it with quotation marks...?)
So basically there is an accusation of owning child pornography but as no charges being pressed there can be no challenging, no trial or anything...?
The OIC said the decision can be appealed which I am planning to push for I think. The thing for me is not the phone as such, I feel like I really need to know if there is more to this whole awfull s**t. I am a mother of 2, I need to know if my person made indecent fotos of our kids. I cannot understand how they would drop this anyway, where there s an image, there s a victim, no?
Any advice much appreciated
I wonder if anyone has had a similar situation and might give advice.
My person was arrested for sexual communication (vigilante group). He stayed in a hotel for work the day he was arrested. All devices he had with him were taken (2 Laptops, 2 phones). After being remanded for 7 weeks he had sentencing and got a suspended sentence. Now the OIC contacted us to ask when we would pick up everything and that "most" of the items would be returned. Turns out his private phone they do not want to hand out but destroy it.
Checked with the solicitor that we had for the case and he wrote an email to the OIC saying that no charges were brought in respect of indecent images of children. No
reference was made to any images contained thereon within the course of
the proceedings and no forfeiture and destruction order was made by the
court. Hence telling police to return the device.
The OIC replied that indecent images where found but "due to short time" before sentencing they decided to not press charges as that was seen disproportionate.
The are talking about:
<30 indicative images
<10 category 4 images
<10 category 'C' images (yes, they put it with quotation marks...?)
So basically there is an accusation of owning child pornography but as no charges being pressed there can be no challenging, no trial or anything...?
The OIC said the decision can be appealed which I am planning to push for I think. The thing for me is not the phone as such, I feel like I really need to know if there is more to this whole awfull s**t. I am a mother of 2, I need to know if my person made indecent fotos of our kids. I cannot understand how they would drop this anyway, where there s an image, there s a victim, no?
Any advice much appreciated
It probably depends on the age of the people in the image. Lots of legal porn sites will have images of young girls, but establishing the exact age will be impossible.
The categorisation of images is not an exact science. The police appear to be mixing up two different things. There was a 10 point scale used in the past, but now it is just 3 cats, A,B and C. There is no cat 4 in legal terms.
Indicative images could be any legal porn where the person is under 25. It could also be images of children who are fully clothed, but if it were your own children, then the police would definately have told you about that, so I think it is highly unlikely.
I am not sure that appealing the decision to destroy the device is wise, because the police could still prosecute for the cat C images. But it might be an idea to ask the solicitor to ask the police if they can see the images. Then they would have a better idea of what was involved and whether the CPS would really prosecute or not.
The categorisation of images is not an exact science. The police appear to be mixing up two different things. There was a 10 point scale used in the past, but now it is just 3 cats, A,B and C. There is no cat 4 in legal terms.
Indicative images could be any legal porn where the person is under 25. It could also be images of children who are fully clothed, but if it were your own children, then the police would definately have told you about that, so I think it is highly unlikely.
I am not sure that appealing the decision to destroy the device is wise, because the police could still prosecute for the cat C images. But it might be an idea to ask the solicitor to ask the police if they can see the images. Then they would have a better idea of what was involved and whether the CPS would really prosecute or not.
Hi edel, thank you for your reply.
I m not sure if police would inform me to be fair, they have never asked age, gender or any foto of my kids so they cannot tell if it would be my children in the fotos, no?
I had a lengthy discussion with chatgpt yesterday and i understood that the evidence would not be presented to a solicitor neither - only by taking it to court one could maybe get an independent expert to asess.
The cat 4 i also didn t understand but found a description that this would be something like child pornography that is not photorealistic - like drawings or comics i assume...? to be brutally honest i do not really care if appealing would lead to investigation or anything, my person has to take responsibility i think - and i need clarity for the sake of the kids :(
Do you have the experience that an appointed solicitor would be presented the evidence?
I m not sure if police would inform me to be fair, they have never asked age, gender or any foto of my kids so they cannot tell if it would be my children in the fotos, no?
I had a lengthy discussion with chatgpt yesterday and i understood that the evidence would not be presented to a solicitor neither - only by taking it to court one could maybe get an independent expert to asess.
The cat 4 i also didn t understand but found a description that this would be something like child pornography that is not photorealistic - like drawings or comics i assume...? to be brutally honest i do not really care if appealing would lead to investigation or anything, my person has to take responsibility i think - and i need clarity for the sake of the kids :(
Do you have the experience that an appointed solicitor would be presented the evidence?
There are rules on court disclosure that say all evidence must be shown to the defence, but the CPS can in practice wait until the last possible moment to do this, such as the date of a trial. All the solicitor can do is ask, really.
Since no charges have been brought, it sounds like the images have not been shown to the CPS yet, quite possibly because the police themselves did not really think they were prosecutable.
As for identifying the children, the most obvious giveaway would be the background and the context of the image. Images taken in a family home setting are the ones most likely to be of the persons own child and the police would compare the fixtures and fittings of the room, for example. There is also a database of known images they can compare things to.
Any suggestion that the child is new and not already on the database, should be investigated to see if the person was taking photos of their own or other children. If that were the case then I would expect social services to interview the children too. If that has not happened, then the police will have ruled out any possibility that these are new images.
Since no charges have been brought, it sounds like the images have not been shown to the CPS yet, quite possibly because the police themselves did not really think they were prosecutable.
As for identifying the children, the most obvious giveaway would be the background and the context of the image. Images taken in a family home setting are the ones most likely to be of the persons own child and the police would compare the fixtures and fittings of the room, for example. There is also a database of known images they can compare things to.
Any suggestion that the child is new and not already on the database, should be investigated to see if the person was taking photos of their own or other children. If that were the case then I would expect social services to interview the children too. If that has not happened, then the police will have ruled out any possibility that these are new images.
thank you again <3
that explains a lot to me
I am not UK based, my person was just arrested in UK
that is why social services from UK will not be involved and I m trying to gather the information to pass anything to my local SS.
I appealed the destruction in writing now and asked a sort of report in order to understand where the images native or downloaded etc.
I ll share the feedback here once I get news
that explains a lot to me
I am not UK based, my person was just arrested in UK
that is why social services from UK will not be involved and I m trying to gather the information to pass anything to my local SS.
I appealed the destruction in writing now and asked a sort of report in order to understand where the images native or downloaded etc.
I ll share the feedback here once I get news