A REPEAT sex offender caught with illegal child abuse images on his laptop told police he assumed that any young girl wearing nail varnish was an adult.

Carlisle Crown Court heard that 70-year-old Kenneth Edward McNabb committed his latest offences despite having previously been given chances to reform.

The pensioner, of Ellesmere Way, Morton, Carlisle, was jailed for a year after he admitted two counts of downloading child abuse images and breaching his sexual harm prevention order. One charge involved a Category B image and the other Category C images.

Gerard Rogerson, prosecuting, said the background included a conviction dating back to 1999 when the defendant was jailed for indecent assaults on a child.

After his release from jail, he was convicted of 15 offences of possessing indecent images of children. He was spared prison and put on a Sex Offender Treatment Programme.

Yet three years later, he was back before a court for similar offending, the court heard. On that occasion, he was given a more comprehensive treatment order to tackle this offending.

Of the latest offences, Mr Rogerson added: "His [police] interview was long and rambling and he denied that the people shown in the images were children.

"Rather bizarrely, he explained that he had a system for making sure he didn't view children."

This involved him reasoning that any young person wearing a "wedding ring or nail varnish" would inevitably be aged over 18, he claimed. "When challenged, he admitted his system didn't hold water," added Mr Rogerson.

The defendant's barrister said the public could be better protected by treating McNabb's "illness," not jailing him.

But Recorder Mark Rhind QC told the defendant - whose aliases include the surnames Hargadon and Hagadon: "Despite treatment, and two separate sexual offences prevention orders, you continue to offend."

The judge said that McNabb appeared to be among the 'minority' of people who, once they have crossed the Rubicon and started to offend in this way, they carry on offending.

McNabb had tried to "laugh off" what he had done in his police interview, said the judge, adding: "All this leads me to the sad conclusion that there is no immediate prospect that you will change your ways.

"These are not images, or virtual things; these are pictures of real children being abused in the real world - the sort of abuse which happens because there is a demand for this sort of appalling material from people like you, who create the demand.

"The children who suffer in order to create this material no doubt suffer for a long time - probably for their entire lives."

The defendant - whose previous offences were dealt with by courts in Ormskirk and Burnley - will remain on the Sex Offender Register for the next decade.