A Lavington childcare worker has avoided jail after accessing child pornography.
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James Monohan, 24, used his phone to search the internet for photos of girls aged as young as 13 in January last year, with most of the images depicting those aged 14 to 16.
Albury detectives received information that he had accessed a website known to police, which included galleries containing child pornography.
His Lavington home was raided on February 7 last year and Monohan handed over his electronic devices, including a Samsung mobile phone.
A check of his phone browser history showed searches on the site and the 24-year-old made extensive admissions to the investigators.
Image titles included "jailbait" and titles related to 14 and 15-year-old girls were found in his web history.
He said the photographs were all nude images, but none of the people depicted were engaged in sexual acts with others.
Some showed the girls engaged in sexual acts with themselves.
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Police had been unable to conduct a forensic search of the Samsung phone as its plug-in port was damaged, and the images were unable to be recovered.
Monohan provided evidence against himself about the nature of the images.
Judge Sean Grant recently told the District Court the offending was at the "lower end of the spectrum of objective seriousness".
"The number of images is small," he said.
"Save for the two images involving masturbation, the gravity of the sexual activity depicted was at the low end of the scale."
But he said such material had victims, with deterrence important.
"The possession of the material creates a continued market for the continued corruption and exploitation of children," he said.
"It is not a victimless crime and harm is ongoing due to the very fact that the material remains on the internet."
He imposed a nine-month jail term, but released him on the condition he be of good behaviour for two years.
