Michael Mackie sentenced for child abuse material possession

A court has heard a Sydney supermarket worker found with dozens of obscene child abuse material videos saved to his computer was motivated by “sick curiosity”.

A Sydney supermarket worker and admitted internet addict found with 100 child abuse material videos on his computer has narrowly escaped jail time.

NSW Police began investigating Michael Mackie, 35, in June 2021 after they became aware his IP address had accessed child abuse material.

A subsequent raid at his Rockdale address uncovered 100 child abuse material videos on his desktop computer, saved to a folder named “Michael’s stuff”.

Police also found a set of handcuffs in his bedside drawer, though the court accepted they were not used for any nefarious purpose.

He was subsequently charged and pleaded guilty to child abuse material possession and prohibited weapon possession.

Mackie’s barrister Ben Barrack told Magistrate Sally McLaughlin his client did not have any pedophilic tendencies.

Michael Mackie, 35.

“He says it’s a sick curiosity, he did not seek out this material in the first place,” Mr Barrack told the court.

“This is genuinely aberrant behaviour – he had, but for this very brief period, led an otherwise prosocial life.”

The court heard Mackie had accessed and downloaded the material after it appeared in pop-ups while he was accessing music and other pornography on an online streaming service.

Mr Barrack said Mackie had suffered anxiety and other mental health conditions due to a deprived childhood marred by domestic violence, which impaired his judgment the day he accessed the illegal material.

“His description of the heartbreak in needing to discuss this with his parents and his partner is a matter that goes a long way to an assessment of remorse,” Mr Barrack told the court.

“There’s been no attempts to shy away from this and there’s been an understanding of the trauma that must be experienced by children in order for these videos to be produced.”

As Mackie was charged with a prescribed sexual offence, an intensive corrections order was not available to the court.

Ms McLaughlin did not consider the matter warranted full time imprisonment and Mackie was instead sentenced to a two-year supervised community corrections order with a condition to remain in psychological treatment.

“It was 100 videos, it’s not an insignificant amount of videos clearly but a number of the authorities in relation to this offending involve thousands of videos,” Ms McLaughlin said.

“This is not a victimless crime – the victims are young children – but I’m satisfied this offence and the length of time that the possession of the material occurred … can be met in this case by convicting the offender and ordering that he enter into a community corrections order.”

The court heard Mackie’s partner and his parents remained supportive of him and that both his partner and her father had written letters of support to the court for his sentence.