A PAEDOPHILE who had ‘stomach-churning’ conversations with other predators deliberately sought out the company of children and aspired to move on to raping and sexually abusing young boys.

Daniel Byrne-Crowley was charged with three offences of making indecent images of children and one of sexual communication with a child.

He was alleged to have had one Category A image – the most serious type, 11 Category B images, and 10 Category C images.

The offences took place between August 2012 and September 2020, while he was alleged to have been inappropriately talking with a 10-year-old boy between June 2019 and September 2020.

The 28-year-old pleaded not guilty to all charges, despite what Judge Thomas described as “overwhelming evidence”.

The jury took just over half an hour to return unanimous guilty verdicts on each offence.

During the trial, prosecutor Helen Randall told the jury that police raided Byrne-Crowley’s home address on Bush Street in Pembroke Dock on October 28, 2020. They seized two phones, a MacBook computer, and an iPad, on which they found 23 child abuse images on his devices – one of which was inaccessible.

These included pictures and videos of children as young as four being sexually abused.

Ms Randall said that officers also discovered what appeared to be conversations between the complainant and other adult men discussing indecent images, masturbation, and oral sex.

The police also recovered conversations on the devices with a 10-year-old boy.

Ms Randall said the conversations involved pornography, masturbation, giving the boy a computer, and going to Oakwood theme park.

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During cross-examination, the defendant denied having a sexual interest in children.

“It’s a fantasy,” he replied when asked about the messages. “Wants and fantasies are completely different things.”

When asked how the images got on his devices, Byrne-Crowley said: “I don’t know. But I know I didn’t purposely download and go in search of those images.”

He later claimed, for the first time in proceedings, that the images could have been on the devices when he bought them second-hand.

At a sentencing hearing at Swansea Crown Court, defence barrister James Hartson said: “Nothing I can say about the offences can assist the defendant or the court.

“Mr Byrne-Crowley does not agree with the verdict, but he accepts it.

“This is still a man of relative youth. He’s 28.”

Mr Hartson said the defendant had put his time in custody “to good use” and had secured a role for himself within the prison, and was of previous good character..

Judge Paul Thomas KC said: “You are clearly an exceptionally arrogant individual who is nowhere near as clever as you think you are.

“Your defence was ridiculous. It made no sense whatsoever.

“The trial you insisted on having vividly illustrated that you are potentially a very dangerous paedophile.

“The content of your conversations was stomach-churning.”

Judge Thomas added that the conversations showed that the rape and sexual abuse of young boys was something that Byrne-Crowley “aspired to do in future”.

“You deliberately sought the company of children, including the child you were conversing with,” he continued.

“There was evidence you went to the USA in order to work at a youth camp. The messages relating to that were particularly concerning.”

Judge Thomas said the defendant was potentially “an exceptionally dangerous paedophile” who could likely go on to commit “contact offences”.

Byrne-Crowley, now of Swily Road in Dublin, was jailed for a total of 21 months. This includes 15 months for sexual communication with a child, six months each – running concurrently to each other and consecutive to the 15-month sentence – for making Category A and B indecent images of children, and two months – also running concurrently – for making Category C indecent images.

He must sign the sex offenders register for 10 years, and was made the subject of a sexual harm prevention order for the same amount of time.