A MAN who viewed indecent images and videos of children just minutes before his arrest has been jailed for a year.

Nicky Hutson, from Harwich, accessed the files less than an hour before officers from the Police Online Investigation Team knocked on his door.

Essex Police said officers had acted on intelligence to carry out a search at the 31-year-old’s home address on July 27 last year.

They seized a mobile phone which was later found to contain storage applications containing 157 indecent images and videos of children, 94 of which were the most serious category A.

Hutson was later charged with three counts of making indecent images of children and one count of possessing an extreme pornographic image involving an animal.

He pleaded guilty to all counts and was sentenced at Chelmsford Crown Court on Tuesday, July 2.

Hutson was sentenced to 12 months in prison and made the subject of a 10-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

He was also put on the Sex Offenders’ Register.

Dc Sam Petken from the Police Online Investigation Team, said: “Hutson initially denied any knowledge of the images and videos on his mobile phone.

"He claimed he had received a link to a drop box containing the images by a stranger and had tried to delete them but didn’t know how.

“However data showed the files had been accessed from September 2015 up until less than an hour before his arrest."