A council worker who downloaded 165 pornographic images of children as young as five has been jailed for nine months.

Peter Milam, 37, admitted ten charges of making obscene pictures after police raided his home on December 23, 2002, and seized his computer. Another computer at his parents' home in Horsham was also found to have indecent images on its hard drive.

Police estimated the children pictured were aged between five and eight.

Christine Laing, prosecuting at Lewes Crown Court yesterday, said police found Milam had made internet searches for "pre-teens", "Asian pre-teens" and "illegal pre-teens".

She said: "He said he did not know how the images appeared in a computer file on his computer."

John Mannion, defending, said Milam, of Broome Close, Horsham, had not realised the images were being saved in a temporary internet folder as he downloaded them.

Since his arrest, Milam had quit his job as a junior clerk for Horsham District Council and had been asked to leave the house he was sharing with a friend.

Mr Mannion said: "He has no specific memory of using those search terms."

Judge Charles Kemp said: "I have seen an example of these images and they are of very young children. They are real human beings. They have mothers and fathers. Somewhere on this planet an unscrupulous person is forcing them into disgusting positions to have their photo taken.

"Nobody knows what untold damage is done to these children but, by downloading these images, you are perpetuating the trade of that disgusting form of entertainment."

Another 155 images on Milam's computer were taken into account. He was placed on the sex offenders register for ten years.