Here you have a sickening story about a guy caught with thousands of bestiality images, and the judge seems more worried about his teeth and self-esteem.
A TASMANIAN computer technician who considered himself a beast has been given a suspended jail sentence after being caught possessing bestiality images.Sure. Or maybe he's just one sick guy.
Rodney Scott McLagan, 48, of South Arm, today was sentenced after pleading guilty to possessing 31,000 illegal images, most involving human female sex acts with dogs, ponies, snakes, tigers and an octopus.
Although 30 per cent of the total images involved child pornography, Hobart Supreme Court Justice David Porter today said only 20 per cent of those were actually viewed by McLagan.
"Your interests lie in the bestiality material," Justice Porter said in sentencing today.
McLagan's lawyer David Barclay told the court that his client had little or no interest in child pornography, and no relevant prior convictions.
Those images were downloaded in bulk along with the bestiality material, Mr Barclay said.
McLagan, a single man with no children, pleaded guilty on July 4 to possessing bestiality products and child exploitation material.
Police found the images on computers and discs discovered during a search of McLagan's home, near Hobart, on January 6 last year.
A psychiatric report tendered to the court showed McLagan suffers from an avoidant personality disorder, leaving him ill-equipped to achieve normal intimacy.
The disorder often leaves its sufferers with chronic social anxiety and loneliness, without the opportunity for normal sexual relationships, and fantasy is often indulged, the court was told.
Justice Porter said: "It also emerges from the report that you are particularly self-conscious about your teeth".
"One of the consequences of all of this in your case is that you equate yourself with a beast, reflecting the level of your self-esteem.
"It is that which motivated your accessing the material you did."
