A repeat offender caught with more than 3000 files of child abuse material could spend up to two years in prison for his crimes.
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Police officers raided a Castlemaine address last March after receiving information about a Twitter account and discovered thousands of files across several devices.
Graham Hatcher pleaded guilty in the Bendigo Magistrates' Court to five counts of knowingly possessing child abuse material, as well as breaching his reporting obligations as a registered sex offender.
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This was not the first time the 40-year-old was caught with child abuse material - about a decade ago he was jailed for similar offending, and 10 years before that he was sentenced to a community corrections order for possession.
In sentencing Hatcher this week, magistrate Patrick Southey took into account his guilty plea and noted he was cooperative with police.
Mr Southey said the delay in the matter would have also weighed heavily on Hatcher, and his autism would make prison tougher for him than other people.
Hatcher had some insight into his offending, he said, and history suggested he was capable of rehabilitation for some period of time, although an expert assessed him as being of moderate risk of reoffending.
But Mr Southey admonished Hatcher for possessing a large amount of "absolutely repugnant material involving very young children".
"These are real children... and you are the market for this material," he said.
Mr Southey sentenced Hatcher to two years' imprisonment, with a non-parole period of 10 months.
Hatcher was already a lifetime registered sex offender, but he was again placed on the register for life.
Mr Southey said that if it were not for Hatcher's guilty plea, the matter would almost certainly have fallen beyond the jurisdiction of the Magistrates' Court and he would have faced a much longer sentence.
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