A Wollongong man will spend at least a decade behind bars after he downloaded hundreds of thousands of images of child pornography from the Dark Web before his wife discovered his dark and perverted secret.
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Romen Vargas, 44, was sentenced 14 years in jail, with a non parole period of 10 years, when he appeared in Wollongong District Court on Friday for possessing child abuse material, among other charges.
Judge Andrew Haesler said Vargas appeared to show "compulsive behaviour" when he saved more than 300,000 images onto several devices.
"It appears he had been viewing the material for many years prior to his detection," he said. "He has a preoccupation with prepubescent girls."
Judge Haesler said Vargas was "for much of his life a respectable citizen, worker and family man" but committed serious offences against the community and the unknown victims of the many images that were produced.
"Trust is lost when the vulnerable are abused," he said.
"Vargas put his own interest above everyone else but ultimately he self destructed.
"He has lost his reputation. He has lost his family."
Agreed facts said Vargas' wife was using his computer to retrieve her own files on June 16, 2020 when she came across a large number of deleted images of young girls.
She soon discovered thousands of images of young girls in their underwear posed in sexually explicit ways, which were sorted into files under names.
A few days later, Vargas' wife told a medical professional about what she had uncovered before a mandatory report was filed and she contacted police.
On June 23, police executed a search warrant and seized devices.
An examination of the computer revealed the IT specialist had more than 200,000 files, located in a single folder, of child pornography.
The device contained more than 5000 videos with at least 2000 of them of real girls involved in sexual acts.
Police analysed a hard drive which contained almost 800,000 images. Officers estimate thousands of pictures were child abuse material.
More than 200,000 images were found on Vargas' Samsung tablet, with police again estimating thousands were child pornography with the device also having videos that depicted children as young as seven in sexual acts with adults.
Judge Haesler said there was "nothing particularly organised or sophisticated" about Vargas storing the images because they were kept on devices his wife could access.
Alarmingly, police found a 170-page PDF document titled "how to practice child love" which provided a step-by-step guide for adults to sexually abuse children.
Judge Haesler said the document was a "manual of methodology for abusing children".
"Such documents, even if they do not involve real children, are evidence of and perpetuate a distorted view of reality in which sex with children is somehow seen as appropriate," he said.
"It is a particularly egregious example."
Seized CDs and DVDs with more child abuse images were uncovered, with one dating back to 1999.
Judge Haesler took into account a psychological report which stated Vargas tried to justify and minimise his actions and "lacked insight into his offending".
"He knew what he was doing was wrong and he made efforts to conceal what he was doing," Judge Haesler said.
He hoped Vargas could be released having received support and treatment for his underlying paedophilic tendency after he engaged in programs.
Vargas will be eligible for parole in July 2030.
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