Man with child abuse images spared prison

A52-year-old man whose wife found indecent photographs of children on his phone after she became wary of his online activities has avoided a prison sentence.

Spencer Schee was caught with 172 child sexual exploitation and abuse images and eight videos on his Samsung Galaxy X9 phone.

Of these, 43 images and three videos were of the most graphic kind (category A).

The children featured were girls and boys estimated to be aged between three and 14.

Schee, of Minto Crescent, Glenrothes, appeared at Dunfermline Sheriff Court for sentencing.

Defence lawyer Alan Davie told the court his client was “absolutely disgusted” with his own offending.

The lawyer said it has led to the end of his 21-year marriage and 30-year relationship and he is now “estranged” from family and friends and is “very much rock bottom” but motivated to make changes in his life.

Sheriff Susan Duff told Schee: “I can see you have lost everything in your life as a result of this offence.”

She sentenced Schee to 120 hours of unpaid work and imposed a supervision order for 18 months.

Conduct requirements were also imposed on his use of devices to access the internet and for him to not make contact with children under the age of 16 unless approved. Schee was also placed on the sex offenders register for 18 months.

Procurator fiscal depute Marie Lyons told the court previously that in December 2020, Schee’s wife came home to find him “flustered” on the couch and they argued when she asked him what he was doing. He would not allow her to look at his phone and his wife formed the opinion he was talking to women online.

In March 2021, she searched through old photos on the Google Cloud app on her husband’s phone while it was unattended.

She found numerous indecent photos and videos containing children, all dated 2020.

His wife sent the videos and images to her own phone via Whatsapp, saved them in a file and emailed them to a newly created Outlook email account in case he gained access to her phone and deleted them.

Schee then accessed her phone while she was upstairs and deleted the content.

She confronted her husband and told him police would be notified and then ended the relationship and evicted him from the marital home.

Police later seized and analysed phones and a laptop.

The court heard a transcript of part of a police interview in which Schee claimed to officers he was chatting to women on a messenger app who talked him into a younger “role playing game” and denied being attracted to children.

Schee pled guilty to taking or permitting to be taken or making indecent photographs or pseudo-photographs of children at two addresses in Glenrothes and Kirkcaldy, between March 21 and April 8 last year.

Spencer Schee.