James Davison jailed after claiming his child porn ‘wasn’t illegal’
A sick former education department staffer thought it wasn’t wrong to have more than 800 images of child abuse material and was desperate to avoid jail.
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An unemployed former Canberra public servant will spend Christmas behind bars after police found a “depraved” collection of child abuse material on his home computer.
Former Commonwealth Education Department staffer James William Davison on Tuesday fronted the ACT Supreme Court and was jailed for nine months, to be suspended after three months served.
Davison, 49, had earlier pleaded guilty to possessing child abuse material, after police found more than 800 images on his computer.
Justice Michael Elkaim said it was disturbing Davison told court report writers he didn’t think he had done anything illegal and that his actions hadn’t hurt any children.
“The offender’s belief could not be more wrong,” Justice Elkaim said.
Justice Elkaim said every child who had been abused for the sake of producing child pornography would have suffered “humiliation, horror and long-term damage”.
“Every child in every video was exploited … every one of them will be damaged, sometimes physically, always mentally, probably for the rest of their lives,” he said.
Davison told a psychologist he only pleaded guilty because he hoped it would get him a suspended sentence.
“I want a quick out option, no jail term, so I can leave Canberra,” Davison told the psychologist.
Justice Elkaim said possessing child abuse material showed “a depravity which is alien to normal human behaviour”.
The court heard Davison was bullied as a child but had a long career in the public service until he quit in 2019, claiming he was overworked.
Justice Elkaim said Davison needed to be jailed to send to other would-be offenders the message that “children are not pawns or plaything for the sexual gratification of adults”.
“There are many terrible types of offences but in my view it is difficult to express more abhorrence than in respect of crimes involving children, their manipulation and their degradation,” he said.
Davison, the court heard, was from a close-knit family of six siblings but had no children of his own, and has lived alone since his partner died in 2015.
Davison will be released in January.