A FORMER Ipswich pub chef downloaded nearly 5,000 sexual images of children and pretended to be a 17-year-old girl on an internet chat site, a court heard.

A FORMER Ipswich pub chef downloaded nearly 5,000 sexual images of children and pretended to be a 17-year-old girl on an internet chat site, a court heard.

Mark Graham, 37, pleaded guilty to 16 specimen counts of making indecent photographs of children and to 16 counts of possessing such images.

Ipswich Crown Court heard that 4,504 pictures were discovered on Graham's computer at the least serious level one, 280 were at level two, 135 at level three, 40 at level four but none were at the most serious level five.

Robert Sadd, prosecuting, said Graham admitted he subscribed to a chat site and posed as a 17-year-old girl in that chat room.

Alison Ginn, mitigating, said her client had started surfing the net when he was a live in chef at a large Ipswich pub. She said: “If he was not with his girlfriend or working he got bored and started surfing the net for adult pornography.

“He is not a computer buff and one link led to another and that led to a chat site.”

Ms Ginn said Graham of Cunningham Close, Thetford, entered the sites as himself when he was drunk but changed his identity when he realised many others had done so.

She said he was sent various photographs and looked at each of them for a few seconds before closing them.

She added: “He found himself hooked on this virtual world. He was intrigued when he was exploring it out of curiosity.”

Graham who lost his job, accommodation and girlfriend through offending, initially could not understand how viewing sexual pictures of children fed the abuse trade.

Judge John Devaux said that people like Graham provided a demand for such images and this encouraged the abuse of children in the real world.

Graham was jailed for 20 weeks and told to sign the sex offenders' register.

He was made the subject of a sexual prevention order and disqualified from working with children for seven years.