Kyle Cornish jailed for viewing child abuse material from dark web at Woolooware home

A young man from Sydney’s south has been jailed after accessing the dark web to view child abuse material before investigators discovered the files in his trash folder, a court has heard.

Kyle Cornish pleaded guilty to possessing child abuse material and domestic violence offences. Picture: Ashleigh Tullis

A young man has been jailed after he deliberately accessed the dark web to view child abuse material before investigators discovered the files in his trash folder, a court has heard.

Kyle Cornish, 22, was sentenced in Sutherland Local Court on Tuesday after he pleaded guilty to possessing child abuse material, two counts of assault causing actual bodily harm and common assault.

Agreed facts tendered to court said investigators conducted a search warrant at Cornish’s Woolooware home, where he lived with his mother, on August 29 last year.

Cornish told police there was child abuse material in the trash folder of his laptop that he had downloaded after discovering a link for it on the dark web.

Cornish said he moved the material to the trash folder after viewing it and believed the folder deleted the contents after a certain amount of time.

Kylie Cornish was jailed. Picture: Ashleigh Tullis

Police found 10 video files that included young girls no older than five being sexually assaulted by adult men, two 10 year old boys allegedly raping their mother, and an hour long compilation of child abuse videos.

Police discovered the settings on his laptop for the trash folder were not set to auto delete.

In an unrelated incident on December 6, Cornish attacked his father from behind while he was watering his lawn following an argument at their Barden Ridge home.

Cornish punched his father in the head in a “fury of strikes” before his father was able to grab him in a choke to subdue him.

Cornish continued to punch him before they both agreed to stop.

The father sustained cuts and scraps to his arms and hands, and significant bleeding, bruising and cuts to his head.

Only a couple of days later, Cornish and his mother attended Northies Cronulla before Cornish was removed for being too intoxicated.

Once outside, he pushed his mother causing her to fall over and graze her arm.

Cornish was sentenced in Sutherland Local Court.

In court, Cornish’s lawyer Nicholas Breen said his client was “sickened” by the videos and that he immediately deleted them after watching it once.

Mr Breen submitted Cornish had been in a “distressed state and was unwell” due to depression at the time of the offending, adding he had a difficult childhood.

The court heard Cornish had begun psychological treatment and was “motivated” to continue.

Magistrate Holly Kemp accepted Cornish suffered from a mental health impairment and that had a direct nexus on his offending.

However, she declined to divert Cornish under the Mental Health Act given the seriousness of the crimes, that he would be jailed and she was concerned Cornish would not comply with the treatment order.

Ms Kemp said those who accessed child abuse material continued to create a market for the content where vulnerable children were abused and traumatised.

She also noted that Cornish sought to blame his parents for his actions when he assaulted them, and also blamed his mental health for his desire to access the child abuse material.

Ms Kemp took into account his mental health, youth and lack of criminal history.

Cornish was sentenced to jail for 14 months with a non parole period of eight months for the child abuse material charge, while he was placed on community orders for the domestic violence offences.

He will be eligible for release to parole in October.

Originally published as Kyle Cornish jailed for viewing child abuse material from dark web at Woolooware home