Child porn nets man 8-month jail term

Former Kelowna man sentenced for possession of 95 photos police say he downloaded from internet

Mathew Thomas Bateman, 34, teared up and snuffled constantly during his sentencing for possession of child pornography Friday in a Kelowna court.

The unemployed chef, who moved from Kelowna into his mother’s house in Brooks, Alta., after being caught with child porn, was sentenced to eight months in jail.

“You’ll have to deal with the consequences of your actions,” said Judge Cathaline Heinrichs as Bateman was led away by a sheriff.

“You have a lot of work to do. Hopefully you will be successful so we don’t see you back here.”

Bateman, who is dark-haired with a beard and has a small tattoo of a bird on his neck, appeared for his sentencing dressed in an ill-fitting black suit with purple shirt and purple tie.

He brought a backpack of possessions, knowing he would be going to jail for at least six months.

He had no prior criminal record. The mandatory minimum sentence for possession of child pornography recently increased to six months from 45 days.

Heinrichs decided to send a message to Bateman and all others who download child porn by agreeing with Crown prosecutor Patricia O’Neil that the sentence be bumped up to eight months.

When Bateman gets out of jail, he will be on three years’ probation that includes conditions for more counselling ordered by a probation office, restricted internet access and no contact with anyone under 16 unless supervised by one of their parents, who have been informed of Bateman’s conviction.

Bateman will provide a DNA sample to be kept in the national database and report annually for a decade to the National Sex Offender Registry.

“Possession is a serious crime because demand for child pornography leads to production of child pornography and sexual exploitation of children,” O’Neil told the court. “It normalizes abuse of children and may lead to offenders acting on their fantasies.”

Bateman did admit to sharing “dark fantasies” in child porn chat rooms, but insisted he would “never hurt a child.”

Bateman’s connection to child porn came to the attention of Kelowna RCMP when he shared a photo on the internet of a girl who appears to be 10 years old performing oral sex on a man.

Police tracked the internet protocol (IP) address to a Kelowna home Bateman was sharing with a roommate.

It was the roommate’s IP, but police determined Bateman shared the internet connection and had downloaded 95 photos of girls between the ages of seven and 11 being raped by men.

The photos were on his laptop, stored in a folder labelled “pictures.”

Bateman co-operated with the police investigation and met with a psychiatrist, with whom he wasn’t particularly forthcoming.

However, in a meeting with a probation officer he admitted to downloading child porn free off the internet and to sexual role play in chat rooms.

In court, Bateman expressed deep regret, admitted he needed help, advised he has started medication to deal with his depression and anxiety and would continue the counselling he started in Brooks.

The psychiatrist indicated Bateman was a low to moderate risk of reoffending.

Bateman’s defence lawyer, Wade Jenson, brought up Bateman’s rough childhood of verbal and physical abuse by his father and being bullied for his hearing impairment.

Jenson also mentioned Bateman’s depression, anxiety, social isolation and remorse for his crime.

Heinrichs took the mitigating circumstances into consideration, but reiterated none were excuses for his “persistent intent to collect” child pornography over two years.