�A retired geography teacher from Romford is facing a 12-month prison sentence after he admitted downloading 10,000 images of child pornography on his computer.

Robert Morgan Chapman, of Priests Avenue, was sentenced at Blackfriars Crown Court on Tuesday, after pleading guilty to 11 counts of child pornography on July 19.

The indecent images, which were of children as young as two, were discovered after Chapman, 62, used his debit card to pay subscription fees to an internet site with links to another site containing indecent images of children.

When the police searched his property on July 29 last year, the former geography teacher admitted downloading the indecent images. He told the officers: “I am afraid I have.”

The police seized two computer towers, two external hard drives and disks from his home.

‘Good character’

Character references were also read out in court from Chapman’s godson and some of his friends, which said that they were shocked by the offence, which was completely out of character.

Defence lawyer Yvette Kresner said: “Mr Chapman is willing to address his behaviour and he has always been a man of good character.

“He is ashamed of his actions and is devastated to the point that he said that he was relieved and pleased when the police knocked on his door because he knew that the habit would be broken.”

After seeing some of the images, judge Aidan Marron QC said: “You have been downloading this material for many years, and as long as this continues, children will be exploited. I have looked at some of the material and must confess that it is apparent to me from the selection of the material that many of these children were in a lot of distress.

“There are 10,000 examples of offending material. Significantly, nearly 1,000 of them are level four images and 17 at level five. There are 377 moving images at level four and 30 at level five.”

Chapman was also told that his name would be put on the sex offenders register for the next 10 years.