A teacher from a prestigious Melbourne school who downloaded more than 400 child porn images and videos has avoided prison.
John Newton Hewitt, 49, a former Brighton Grammar School history and politics teacher, today received a suspended jail sentence and a good behaviour order.
Hewitt, who once co-authored a book with former Victorian premier John Cain, downloaded and stored naked images and videos of girls aged between four and 17.
They included girls performing sexual acts and shots of their genitals, the Victorian County Court heard.
Hewitt, was due to commence a position at another prestigious Melbourne school - Scotch College - when police raided his home last December, seizing his computer and CDs which contained the pornography .
Judge Frank Gucciardo, who viewed the images, said they were disturbing.
"They are disgusting, offensive and can only be described as evil," Judge Gucciardo said.
"This filth is too readily accessible. If people such as you don't seek these depraved images there will be fewer abused children.
"Children are abused, violated and degraded in order to make a market." Hewitt searched the internet using terms like "illegal underage nudity", "naked underage" and "pre-teen sex".
When arrested Hewitt told police he was addicted to porn.
"When I started accessing pornography I never intended to access these images," the father of three told police.
"If I stop for a minute and think about the trade that is going on behind these images it is horrendous.
"It is something that you fight (accessing the porn) and then you come back again every couple of months."
Judge Gucciardo said the crime of accessing child pornography "rightly outraged" the Australian community and usually called for an immediate imprisonment.
But he said if the community understood Hewitt's background, a suspended sentence would not be a punishment that "shook" the community. He sentenced Hewitt, who pleaded guilty to one count of using a carriage service to access child pornography and one count of possessing child pornography, to 18 months' prison to be served as a two-year good behaviour order.
Judge Gucciardo also sentenced Hewitt to 12 months' prison, wholly suspended for two years. Hewitt must pay $A6000 to the Royal Children's Hospital and a $A10,000 bond to the court.
He will be registered as a sex offender for the next 15 years.
