A former hospital consultant who had more than 90,000 images of children and tried to engage in sexual conversation with someone he believed was a 14-year-old boy has been jailed for more than three years.
Dr Matthew Isles, who worked as an ear, nose and throat specialist prior to his arrest in February this year, had built up a âstaggeringly vastâ collection over five years, Stoke Crown Court heard on Wednesday.
Judge Richard McConaghy jailed the former consultant, who worked at the Royal Stoke University Hospital and County Hospital, Stafford, and had a 22-year career in the Armed Forces before that, for three years and 10 months in relation to 13 offences.
He had previously admitted two counts of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child, voyeurism, three counts of making indecent images of children, possession of a paedophile manual, three counts of distributing indecent images of children, possession of prohibited images of children and two counts of possessing extreme pornographic images.
The judge told the 53-year-old, who wore a dark suit and a blue striped tie in the dock and carried a large black bag, that submissions by his barrister Phil Bradley KC that he should be given a suspended sentence were âoptimisticâ.
He said: âEach and every image depicts a real child suffering real sexual abuse, some of it of the most depraved kind imaginable.â
Prosecution counsel Hunter Gray told the court that Isles engaged in âsexually explicit conversation of a grooming natureâ with an undercover officer posing as a 14-year-old boy on a gay dating site between January 25 and February 6 this year.
While he initially ended the chat after finding out the age of the boy he believed he was speaking to, saying he did not want to be sent to prison, Isles later continued the conversation which involved chatting about âhooking upâ.
When officers visited Islesâ address in Whiston, near Cheadle, Staffordshire, on February 10 to arrest him, a large quantity of items were seized including more than 90,000 images and videos on different devices.
He also had voyeuristic images in a folder called âSpycamâ featuring him and a female he had filmed.
Mr Gray said while the interaction was consensual, the woman did not know she was being filmed and did not consent to being recorded.
Also on his devices were a paedophile manual with instructions on how to abuse children and images that had been distributed on at least three different platforms.
Mr Gray said there was a âhigh volumeâ of images found, including 1,978 category A images, 1,317 category B images, 2,134 category C images and 459 prohibited images of children, with many more that had not been categorised.
Isles had also attempted to engage in sexual communication with a 15-year-old female, which Judge McConaghy described as âutterly calculated groomingâ.
In police interview, Isles admitted having an âaddiction to sex, pornography and child abuse material and an addiction to collecting child sex abuse imagesâ over the space of five years, Mr Gray said.
Defending, Mr Bradley said Isles had made efforts to address his behaviour.
He said: âThe criminal behaviour that this defendant is responsible for is reprehensible and seen through the eyes of disgust by right-thinking members of society.
âThis man, by his own actions, has authored his own downfall. His is a catastrophic fall from grace.
âHis career is in tatters, he simply cannot go back. The impact of his offending is felt by his family and friends who continue to support him.
âWithin a relatively short period of time, five years, he descended into a dark hole, a dark area, but it seems he kept digging.
âHe pleaded guilty at the first opportunity knowing the offences to which he pleaded are indeed serious.
âSome of the material was plainly disgusting, there is no getting behind that. Real children and real people were involved and concerned.â
Judge McConaghy said Isles, who waved at a woman in the public gallery as he was sent down, must serve half of his sentence in custody before he can be released on licence.
He said: âWhen police looked at your devices, there was an enormous amount of child abuse images as well as a paedophile manual.
âThere were also pseudo images of children. By your own admission, you have been collecting them for a number of years.
âThere was a staggeringly vast quantity of images.â
A sexual harm prevention order without limit of time was also imposed.
The University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust (UHNM) said in February that it was fully co-operating with the police in their investigation and has since confirmed that Isles is no longer one of its employees.
Detective Inspector Alex Glover, from Staffordshire Policeâs public protection unit, said: âIsles sought out and hoarded images of the most horrific abuse of children.
âThe continued circulation of child sexual abuse material normalises abuse and incentivises the creation of new content.
âWe have worked closely with NHS organisations and conducted a thorough investigation into the offences committed by Isles.â
