Huw Edwards convicted

BBC, as his employer, knew of his arrest last November

Huw Edwards was convicted yesterday making indecent images of children after admitting three charges. He must return to Westminster Magistrates’ Court on 16 September for what the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has described as a pre-sentencing hearing.

Huw Edwards walks to court yesterday with his legal team

Between 16 December 2020 and 14 August 2021, Edwards, 62, had engaged in online chat with an adult male who had initially contacted him via social media. Police recovered a thread of WhatsApp conversation between the two in the course of which the former BBC presenter received sexually explicit imagery.

Of around 377 images accessed, 41 were indecent images of children. They ranged from the least serious to most serious.

Claire Brinton of the CPS said yesterday:

Accessing indecent images of underage people perpetuates the sexual exploitation of children, which has deep, long-lasting trauma on these victims.

The CPS and the Metropolitan Police were able to prove that Edwards was receiving illegal material involving children via WhatsApp.

This prosecution sends a clear message that the CPS, working alongside with the police, will work to bring to justice those who seek to exploit children, wherever that abuse takes place.

Sentencing guidelines

Making an indecent photograph of a child is an offence under the Protection of Children Act 1978.

Although a defendant convicted in the Crown Court may receive up to 10 years, the maximum penalty in the magistrates’ court is six months.

Under guidelines issued by the Sentencing Council, the court begins by deciding the offence category. Edwards had seven images in category A images, which includes images involving penetrative sexual activity. Two of these showed a child aged between about seven and nine. Edwards also had 12 category B pictures, which involve non-penetrative sexual activity, and 22 photographs in category C, which covers other indecent images.

The court must then consider whether the offence involves possession, distribution or production. For possession of category A material, the starting point is 12 months’ imprisonment. Aggravating factors can increase this to three years and mitigating factors would reduce the sentence to six months. There is normally a reduction of one third for a plea of guilty at the earliest possible opportunity.

At court yesterday, the prosecutor, Ian Hope, said a community order and sexual offender treatment programme could be considered as alternatives to a custodial sentence when there was the prospect of rehabilitation. He also suggested that any custodial sentence might be suspended.

Philip Evans KC, for Edwards, told the court: “He didn’t keep the images, he didn’t send to anyone else. He hasn’t sought any similar images from anywhere else.”

Evans added that Edwards would say he was suffering from mental and physical health difficulties “both at the time of the offending and now”.

Paul Goldspring, the chief magistrate, adjourned the case until September 16. He ordered a probation report to consider the risk of Edwards’s re-offending, the possibility of prison and Edwards’s suitability for a sex offender treatment programme.

Last year, a former Labour MP and former minister was given 28 months’ imprisonment for making and distributing indecent images of children. Paul Clark, who represented his home town of Gillingham in parliament, had more than 1,000 images and movie clips across five electronic devices that showed serious acts of abuse.

In 2022, a retired police officer received a 24 month community order after admitting making indecent images of children as young as three years old.

BBC knew

The BBC, as Edwards’s employer, was told last November that he had been arrested and questioned by the police. At that stage he had not been charged. In a statement yesterday, the BBC said:

The BBC is shocked to hear the details which have emerged in court today. There can be no place for such abhorrent behaviour and our thoughts are with all those affected.

The police have confirmed that the charges are not connected to the original complaint raised with the BBC in the summer of 2023. Nevertheless, in the interests of transparency, we think it important to set out some points about events of the last year.

In November 2023, whilst Mr Edwards was suspended, the BBC as his employer at the time was made aware in confidence that he had been arrested on suspicion of serious offences and released on bail whilst the police continued their investigation. At the time, no charges had been brought against Mr Edwards and the BBC had also been made aware of significant risk to his health.

Today we have learnt of the conclusion of the police process in the details as presented to the court. If at any point during the period Mr Edwards was employed by the BBC he had been charged, the BBC had determined it would act immediately to dismiss him. In the end, at the point of charge he was no longer an employee of the BBC.

The statement explained that, “in the usual way”, its journalists were not told what its managers knew.