Sheffield Crown Court: Jailed paedophile found with indecent images including cannibal-style fetish material

Sheffield Crown Court heard on March 29 how Alastair Yeardley, aged 25, of Ravenfield, Rotherham, had originally been convicted and given a community order with treatment in April, 2021, for possessing indecent images of youngsters. He was also made the subject of a Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

However, police visited Yeardley’s home in January, this year, during routine checks and recovered an undeclared laptop and phone, and a computer tower analysis revealed he had indecent images and 129 prohibited images including cannibal-style fetish material.

Prosecuting barrister Matthew Burdon said: “He said he was struggling to manage his addiction to children. He had the fetish involving the consumption of one party by another.”

Yeardley disclosed a laptop to the officers and they also found a phone and both these devices had not previously been declared to the police as part of the required conditions of his Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

The defendant pleaded guilty to breaching his SHPO by failing to declare a laptop and a phone in January, and he also admitted making five category C indecent images – the least serious category relating to downloaded indecent images of youngsters - between April, 2022 and January, 2023.

Yeardley also admitted possessing 129 prohibited images between April, 2022, and January, 2023, which had included the fetish material.

Mr Burdon said the prohibited images included fetish material such as a person being ‘chewed and swallowed’.

Defence barrister Jessica Butterell said Yeardley, who had alerted officers to the devices in his home during the police visit, had struggled once his previous treatment had stopped but he now recognises the triggers he needs to act upon.

Ms Butterell added: “His initial offending arose out of a time when he was taking cannabis and he was distressed and emotional. It started as a trigger to alleviate stress and he is now open and honest about his feelings and if it happens again he knows to seek help.”

Yeardley has also begun making a journal recording his thoughts and feelings which he says has ‘greatly assisted him’, according to Ms Butterell, and he wants to make a change and has sought counselling.

She added: “Thinking about the effect on those victims felt like a brick to his face and he became extremely emotional and remorseful.”

Judge Graham Reeds KC told Yeardley he had originally been given a chance with a community order with a sex-offender treatment programme to rehabilitate himself but this had failed.

He said: “Your treatment was a failure. In late 2022 you downloaded more indecent images of children including prohibited images and you breached your SHPO not just by making those downloads but also by obtaining devices that you failed to notify to police.”

Judge Reeds told Yeardley: “It’s now time to impose prison as an appropriate punishment to deter you from behaving in this way in the future.”

He sentenced Yeardley to 14 months of custody and he also imposed an additional five-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order.