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Reporter’s tip-off leads to child porn conviction

A tip-off from a weekly newspaper reporter resulted in a former councillor being arrested and convicted for possessing thousands of pornographic images of children.

Former Bucks Free Press reporter Oliver Evans, left, contacted police about Bob Bate, 62, after being alerted to a Facebook page displaying an inappropriate image of a child on which the ex-councillor had left a comment.

Following the tip-off, police raided Bate’s former Hazlemere home on 10 May last year and discovered his hoard of child and animal porn.

Bate, a former Wycombe councillor ,was sentenced to three years in prison last Friday after pleading guilty to 27 charges relating to possession and distribution of such images, as well as possession of pictures of animal pornography.

Said Oliver: “I opened my email one morning and saw that someone had sent me screenshots from Facebook, with comments and clearly inappropriate photographs of children.

“I found the photographs extremely disturbing and the comments sickening. I immediately contacted the police.

“People who view such images are just as culpable as those carrying out the abuse and taking such photographs.”

Oliver has since moved from the Free Press to Newsquest sister title the Oxford Mail.

Bate eventually stood down from both Wycombe District and Hazlemere Parish councils on 30 September last year, citing ill health.

He was charged the following month and pleaded guilty to all 27 offences in May at Aylesbury Crown Court.

His Honour Judge Simon Davis, who sentenced Bate on Friday at Amersham law courts, described the images as “graphic, sordid and damaging”, telling him they were the “worst he’d ever seen”.

Det Sgt Richard Earl, who led the investigation, said: “We are very grateful to the Bucks Free Press which alerted us to this matter and enabled us to launch a successful investigation.”