A MAN who tracked down and stored scores of depraved films and pictures of child abuse has been jailed for a year.

But Owen Crowther, 37, may never be released from prison because he was on life licence at the time having been convicted of attempted murder.

A judge at Swindon Crown Court told Crowther that his fate would be in the hands of the parole board who may never deem him safe for release.

Crowther, who must also now register as a sex offender, was found with seven films and 92 pictures of mainly young boys being raped and abused when he was arrested last summer.

And when police looked at them they found about a quarter of the files, including all the movies, were in category A which depicted the rape of children.

And when officers went to his home they found he also had a quantity of stolen goods that had come from a burglary which had taken place over the previous week.

Crowther, of Carman Close, Stratton, pleaded guilty to having indecent images of children and handling stolen goods.

He admitted downloading the depraved material between the start of May last year and Thursday, July 24 - the day after he was arrested.

And he was also found to be in possession of the stolen goods between Saturday, July 19, and Thursday, July 24.

The haul included an iPad, a Toshiba laptop, Carrera, Tag Heuer and Casio watches, Sony camcorder and various memory sticks.

He also had a glue gun, Nike trainers, headphones, a Babyliss trimmer and another small hair trimmer, which had been taken in the raid.

Passing sentence, Recorder Ian Lawrie QC said: "You have pleaded guilty to offences of handling stolen goods and what I would call a composite count in relation to a variety of indecent images.

"The most serious are category A, where there are seven films of the 23 images, and a variety of category B and category C. A total of about 99 images.

"These offences are serious. Category A matters are particularly serious.

"What they do show is depraved abuse conducted with very, very, young men. There are some females but the vast majority of them deal with young men: children.

"Whatever prompted you to make these searches and keep them you are, by your actions, encouraging and sustaining the appalling abuse of children, the sexual abuse of children by the fact that you go searching for that material. That is a point often overlooked by defendants."

He imposed a 12-month sentence with a nine month concurrent jail term for the handling stolen goods meaning he will have to register as a sex offender for 10 years.

But he went on to tell him that he would not be released in the normal way at the halfway point because he had been returned to jail under the previous sentence.

"You have been recalled on licence. That is open ended. The parole board will have to decide when you get released if, indeed, you get released," he said.