Ben McCormack to be sentenced on child porn charge

FORMER Channel 9 reporter was back in court today on child porn charges to learn when he will be sentenced.

SELF-CONFESSED “pedo lover” Ben McCormack will be sentenced on child porn charges next month.

The former Channel 9 reporter appeared in the Downing Centre District Court this morning to have the sentencing date set. The 43-year-old last week pleading guilty to two charges of using a carriage service to send child pornography.

McCormack’s lawyer Sam Macedone said he would tender psychiatric reports at the sentencing hearing, which he expected would last three hours.

He told Judge Paul Conlon it was preferable to have the matter dealt with as soon as possible.

Judge Conlon said after reading the police facts it was clear they were “not typical” of the charges McCormack had pleaded guilty to.

“It is a matter though, that having looked at the facts, can I just say that they are not typical of that particular charge,” he said.

McCormack’s lawyer Sam Macedone replied: “Absolutely, Your Honour.”

“Quite different, in fact,” Judge Conlon said.

Outside of court Mr Macedone told reporters he didn’t “read anything into what anyone says” when asked about Judge Conlon’s comments about it not being a typical case.

“I’ll wait to see what happens on the 24th of November.”

He said he had “ no idea” if McCormack would be jailed. He would not say what sort of sentence he would be seeking.

“I’ll be just putting the subjective matters to the court and letting the judge decide, that’s all I can do. I can’t persuade him one way or another.”

Former journalist Ben McCormack arrives at court.

The charges are punishable by up to 15 years jail.

The details of the very explicit conversations that took place between McCormack and a man in Perth were revealed in confronting court documents released after the guilty pleas.

In one, McCormack confessed he favoured boys as young as seven because they had “perfect bodies” and was a “proud pedo, proud b lover”.

In another he told the man he would always be drawn to young boys. “I’ll always have the attraction ... They are beautiful.”

On August 1, the two men talked about their desire for sex with underage boys. The unidentified male said: “Can’t wait to have one for real ha.”

McCormack answered: “They are so beautiful. I want to make love to one so badly.”

Talk then turns to meeting a third man and his nephew and taking turns to have sex with the boy. McCormack said: “Imagine it.”

Specialist police officers from the NSW Sex Crime Squad Child Exploitation Squad arrested McCormack in April after a tip from WA sex crimes detectives who had charged a man with child porn charges.

Lawyer Sam Macedone speaks to the media about McCormack. Picture: David Moir

The man, who McCormack had been talking with, told police he knew McCormack by his username‘Oz4skinboi’. But he revealed he also knew him as “Ben”.

“In one of the [Skype] chats, the male referred to the accused as ‘Ben’. [He] also makes references to the fact that ‘oz4skinboi’ has an affiliation with the 9 Network Program, A Current Affair,” the police facts said.

Speaking outside court last week, Mr Macedone said the conversations were “fantasy” not reality.

“I just wanted to make it quite clear that there were never any images that were traded between Ben and anyone else of any child exploitation material. It was nothing more than fantasy talk, but no transporting of images,” he told reporters.

The delay in pleading guilty was due to the disagreement on the facts, which had been resolved. “That’s what I wanted, that’s what we’ve got, so we’re now pleading guilty and we’ll move on from there,” Mr Macedone said.

The lawyer revealed to news.com.au he had been trolled by people for representing McCormack, with some saying they wished him dead and told him: “I’m going to dance on your grave when you die.”

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