A Derby paedophile insisted in court that he downloaded over 3,000 illegal child sex abuse images to research why other people would download them.
Dainis Bisofs, of Bright Street, claimed he did not get sexual gratification from the thousands of indecent pictures and videos depicting children between six and 12 years old.
The 53-year-old, who pleaded guilty to possessing indecent images, also had images depicting sex with dogs, a court heard.
The court heard that the Latvian man would download the images, view them and then delete them afterwards from his computer.
But forensic analysis of three hard drives seized from his house uncovered 3,622 illegal child sex abuse images, including hundreds of the most serious type.
Bisofs narrowly avoided an immediate prison term when he was sentenced at Derby Crown Court on Monday.
Hal Ewing, prosecuting, said: “These offences came to light when police went to his home address on November 15, 2018.
“The house was searched and a number of devices were seized, in particular a gaming tower attached to a computer.
“There were a significant number of indecent images on three different hard drives in that gaming tower.”
Many of the images had been converted to “thumbnail” file types, which are more difficult to find.
He had found and downloaded the majority of the images through an application called uTorrent, it was said.
Mr Ewing continued: “Usage of that software means that those images would then be capable of being shared with other users.”
Police checked Bisofs' browsing history and found a number of searches that were consistent with finding and downloading the illegal images.
He was arrested and interviewed in November 2018, admitting the offences.
Mr Ewing said: “The defendant says that he did not get sexual gratification from them, but he did it to carry out his own research into why people were interested in such things.”
Judge Julie Warburton responded: “That is a lot of images just to satisfy your curiosity.”
William Bennett, defending, said: “On Valentine’s Day this year he will be 54 years old.
“On his day of arrest before anything was investigated, he made full and frank admissions to the police about what he was doing.
“He made those admissions back in November 2018, but the postal requisition didn’t come out until December 2019.
“He has had to wait for a year through no fault of his own to know his fate.”
Mr Bennett also pointed out that Bisofs made no attempt to distribute the images he had.
Bisofs was found with 227 category A images, the most serious type, 272 category B images and 2,995 category C images.
He also had 128 extreme pornographic images, which included the images depicting sexual intercourse with dogs.
Judge Warburton, sentencing, said: “You are 53 years old and I am told you are of previous good character.
“You pleaded guilty at magistrates’ court at the earliest possible opportunity.
“You have felt remorse and real shame for what you did and you are at a low risk of reoffending in a sexual manner.”
The judge handed Bisofs 12 months in prison, suspended for 18 months.
He is also obliged to complete 150 hours of unpaid work and attend 30 rehabilitation days.
Bisofs is now subject to a sexual harm prevention order and he must sign the sex offenders’ register for the next 10 years.
