A CONVICTED child abuser who took his laptop in for repair and was found to have viewed child pornography has been jailed for a year, with an extended three years' licence.

In a case similar to the undoing of fallen glam rock star Gary Glitter, accountant Ian Barter returned his Acer laptop to Tesco in Cribbs Causeway for exchange or repair and staff became concerned it had been used to display child abuse images.

Staff handed the computer back to Barter and reported him to police, Bristol Crown Court heard.

The next day police visited him at home, examined the Acer as well as a Toshiba laptop, and found just over 100 photos of girls as young as seven being abused, automatically stored on his computer hard drives.

Barter, 46, of Little Meadow Road, Bradley Stoke, pleaded guilty to 11 counts of possessing indecent photographs of children.

The recorder Mr Philip Mott QC told him: "You became reliant on alcohol and pornography. There must have been a level of sexual attraction to under-age females. There are obvious signs of sexual deviancy in your make up."

The recorder ordered Barter to register as a sex offender for ten years and banned him from working with children indefinitely. He made him the subject of a ten-year Sexual Offences Prevention Order (SOPO) designed to keep him away from youngsters, and ordered the forfeiture of his computers.

Paul Cook, prosecuting, said Barter was due to stand trial last month but admitted possessing the images.

Mr Cook said 29 photos were deemed to be the second-from-highest category four, while 26 were category three, 13 were category two and 43 were lowest category one.

The lowest category images show youngsters in "erotic" poses whilst category four photos depict penetrative sexual activity involving a child or children, or both children and adults.

Mr Cook told the court: "Mr Barter brought in the Acer laptop to Tesco as it was not working and he asked for a refund or an exchange. He arranged to collect it later and staff carried out a virus check."

The check raised concerns the machine had been used improperly and it was established under-age sex sites had been visited, the court heard.

Police were informed and recovered two laptop computers from Barter's home the following day.

Analysis of the computers revealed that, on a number of occasions in 2009, search terms had been typed into the Google search engine specific to child abuse, Mr Cook said.

The court heard Barter was jailed for six months in 2008 for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl on top of her clothing.

At the time Sedgemoor justices took into consideration a historical indecent assault in which Barter approached a 15-year-old babysitter when he was naked and kissed her cheek and squeezed her chest.

Robert Duval, defending, said his client had not stored or shared the illicit material, but a historical footprint of his improper searches had been automatically retained.

He stressed the number of images was not large and his client had turned to drink and porn after his wife of 15 years left him.

He said: "I don't seek to suggest that such images cause anything other than harm. He is ashamed of what he's done. He bitterly regrets it."