A MAN who sought out more than 1,200 indecent images of children following the collapse of his business has avoided jail.

Father-of-two Richard Wood, 65, told police that he would look at child pornography at his Chepstow home while his wife went to work.

The retired businessman had admitted to three charges of making indecent images of children, possession of a prohibited image of a child and possession of extreme pornographic images.

Newport Crown Court heard that police executed a search warrant at his house in Vauxhall Road on the morning of November 29 last year.

Prosecutor Nuhu Gobir said that when asked by officers if there were indecent images of children at the house, Wood had said: “Yes, I don’t deny this.”

Wood’s laptop and desktop computer were found to contain 1,220 graphic still images and seven videos.

Of those images, 37 pictures and one video were found to be in category A, the most extreme, and 48 images and one video fell into category B.

The largest haul of images, 1,135, together with three videos, were said to be category C.

A further two prohibited images of children were found, together with extreme pornography depicting sex acts with an animal.

“When he was arrested, Wood said that he understood and that he had seen these images before,” said Mr Gobir.

“In interview he made admissions to the offences and said he didn’t realise they were still on the computer.

“He said that things had changed for him with his business going into liquidation, which left him home alone. When his wife went to work, he used this time to view child pornography.”

Gareth Williams, defending, said that Wood’s offences “spoke for themselves” and that his client was “the author of his own downfall”.

“He has taken full responsibility for his actions and he is full of remorse,” said Mr Williams.

“His fall from grace has been catastrophic, and it has been painful not only for himself but for his family.

“He’s 65 and has never been in trouble before. He’s raised two daughters and was a managing director of a company. Custody would be a change of environment from living at home with his wife of 37 years.”

Judge Tom Crowther QC said that Wood had had a long career which was “for the most part successful” but when it failed, he was left “at home and alone”.

“Out of boredom you searched for this material, and what most people don’t realise is that there are real children behind those images,” he said.

“These were someone else’s daughters, abused to order for the wanting desires of men like you, sitting at their computers.”

Wood was handed a two-year community order with a rehabilitation requirement.