Family and Friends Forum

Its just not right is it that the cases take so long. I think the cps can be a long time, as in months also. My partner is waiting to hear, his case has been with cps for months. The living in limbo is so hard, your life kind of stands still. What a terrible shame he hasnt been able to see his grandchild but it is your sons choice. People react in different ways, maybe in time they can rebuild the trust and have some form of relationship again. I hope that you are still able to see your son and grandchikdren. The internet is a very scary place, i dont think it matters that he didnt groom anyone etc or search for images. I guess its down to why they were shared, what was said in any cinversatuons and what he did about it.

Susie, can't your husbands solicitor chase it up? They should be doing that, waiting for them to make a decision since November 2018 isn't good enough but sadly the CPS in some areas are in meltdown.

It's a bit of a contradiction for the police to say there's no risk yet they have submitted a file to the CPS? The CPS may decline a charge or suggest to the police a caution is possible. If this is offered your husbands solicitor will advise him.

Hope you see an outcome to the next step soon.

We got told there would be a “review” in March by the police (arrest was in Dec) but after reading everyone’s posts on here I can’t really see that March will provide any definitive next steps. Got SS involved due to having kids but I am not sure they realise how long all this can take. I think our one will drag on as partner is adamant that any “indecent” images were from legal sites with people 18 or over so I should imagine if he gets charged he will plead not guilty then will have the added timeframe of a court case.

Hi Big Sigh,

at least you are prepared for the long haul. In the meantime there could be many curve balls. After the computer is examined there may or may not be images the police assess as indecent. Your husband may or may not agree that he’s seen them before. He’ll need careful legal advice on how he responds to the police questions. It is for a judge, jury or district judge to determine ‘indecency’, the police can only submit their assessment of the images as evidence to the court if he is charged.

If there are a low level of images they assess as indecent they could offer a police caution to prevent it getting to court. Your husband may feel this is a better course of action to a court case. Again he’ll need to get an expert opinion from his solicitor. Taking a caution at that stage may seem to be a painless option. However he will then have a criminal record and all that comes with that.

If he’s charged his first appearance will be in the magistrates court, he may opt for a crown court trial (my husband did this) It’s only at court that he will enter a plea.

Im saying this because if he truly isn’t guilty he needs to understand the hurdles and nuances of what lies ahead. It’s after entering a plea that he can instruct a forensic examiner to look at the copy disc of the computer to check the police evidence and provide their own report.

Taking a police caution if you are guilty is probably a good option. If you’re confident you are not guilty taking a caution takes away all your opportunities of challenging what the police evidence is. The presence of illegal images on your computer doesn’t automatically prove guilt on the computer users part.

I’d be very interested to hear how he gets on.

Thanks Jaded - your advice is always appreciated as it seems our partner s cases are/ were similar. I hadn’t thought it through and hadn’t grasped that he would only instruct own forensic person once put in not guilty plea. Sounds obvious now I think about it.

it is a hard one about being guilty or not. If you visit a website which is legal and it says that it will not tolerate pictures of anyone under 18 but then one of the pictures looks like they are under 18, then are you guilty or not?

Also - are pictures of fully clothed teenagers indecent? I have googled the website he says he looked at with clothed teenagers (just to be clear I did NOT go to the website, I just put in a search about whether it was legal or not) and it appears it is “legal” and well known.

I am not saying (nor is he) that any of the above is morally right, but he is confused about whether it is illegal. He was sure his actions were legal when he was doing them, even if they were “wrong”, if that makes sense.

His solicitor says they have only had one case like his before - the solicitor usually deals with people with cat A, etc where it is pretty clear cut.

Another question - does my partner and his solicitor get to see the images the police have before accepting a caution ? Or is it just the number and the category that the police tell you.?

Yes it’s quite a complicated subject, especially when talking about a few cat c or borderline images.

Yes your husband would see the images before he was charged. His solicitor will be present but may or may not see them too. He should just listen to what the police say, he may or may not be advised to make a ‘no comment’ reply. That should never infer guilt but is a legal entitlement and protects the accused.

They should say where the images were found too as they should provide evidence of the guilty act. As I’ve said before ‘legal’ websites don’t protect you in the eyes of the police. Some ‘legal’ websites the police don’t like. Why they don’t close them down then or get google to do something about those sites I’ll never know!

im not legally qualified but but have been through it and done hours and hours of research.

I noted on another thread you said the solicitor can’t do much until the outcome of the investigation is known but they need to talk your husband through the possibilities and the possible outcomes. Solicitors attitude though is let the evidence come to you, don’t try to anticipate and provide possible explanations of what may happen, it’s for the crown to prove your guilt not the other way around. Take it a step at a time but keep in touch if you can.

Unless images are found and then there’s a reverse burden for your husband to prove his innocence on the balance of probabilities (I think!)

Images of fully dressed 18 year olds can be considered to be provocatively posing. There could also be dispute on the age of the person in the image.

Unfortunately people often confuse ‘morality’ with ‘legality’, as I’ve said before that’s a dangerous game. One persons morals are not always shared by another. When people are convicted on morals we are into very dangerous territory indeed. You shouldn’t lose your liberty and leave livelihood on morals.

Sorry for the fractured replies.

Where an image coming from a legal website is considered indecent (usually older teenagers) the site themselves can be contacted to establish if they have age details of the person in the image. This has been done before. Most of the sites have servers abroad where the law is different. The difficulty arises when the images contain little or no metadata. No time stamps, no website and are categorised as ‘may have been deketed’. There’s no way to confirm how old the person is then. It’s then up to a judge, jury or district judge to establish the age.

Have you seen some of the adult models on these websites? Some look very young, most if not all of the legal sites have teen categories where the models are actually adult women over 18.

There are many shades of grey at the lower end of this offence. Age being one of them. It’s not as black and white as the general public (and many professionals) are led to believe.

i truly hope it works out for you. Just wait and see what the police come up with.

All the best x