Former police inspector Christopher Wratten became a disgrace to his force after downloading sickening pornographic images of children.

Yesterday, he began a six-month prison sentence after he was jailed by Judge Richard Brown, who told Lewes Crown Court: "Everyone has to realise that every picture of a child that is downloaded represents the abuse of a child."

Wratten, 49, of Bancroft Road, Bexhill, who served with Sussex Police for 29 years and was last stationed in Hastings until his resignation, was handed down a two-year extended sentence and was placed on the sex offenders' register for ten years.

At an earlier hearing he had admitted to seven counts of making indecent pseudo photographs of children after more than 100 images were retrieved from his home computer.

Wratten had also admitted downloading a further 800 images of children on to disc, which he had later destroyed.

He was caught after using his credit card to download pornographic images brought him to the attention of officers working on a nationwide crackdown of child pornography.

Dressed in a smart grey suit, blue tie and shirt, he listened intently as his defence barrister James Mason went through the former policeman's mitigation for well over an hour.

At the back of the court his wife Paula sat flanked by friends and family, sometimes crying, sometimes wringing her hands as she waited to hear her husband's fate.

The court heard her health had progressively declined since her husband's arrest.

Mr Mason told Judge Brown how Wratten's life lay in tatters in light of the court proceedings.

He told the court: "His quite outstanding career, which it clearly had been over three decades on the Sussex Police force, is in ruins and has come to an end in the most desperately dreadful circumstances."

Mr Mason said Wratten's good name had been tarnished forever.

Psychiatric reports carried out at the request of the judge revealed Wratten had made a serious attempt on his life and would find it hard to cope with life inside, possibly slipping into a depressive illness.

Thirty-three friends and former colleagues wrote letters of commendation about Wratten to support his mitigation.

Former cadets spoke of his leadership skills and fellow officers spoke of a fair, decent and honest colleague.

Mr Mason pointed out that in many other cases people who downloaded child porn had thousands, even tens of thousands of images.

He said: "The quantity of the material we are dealing with is of a very, very limited nature."

The images themselves were considered by the prosecution to be in the low to middle range of a scale which judges the seriousness of such material.

Wratten's sentence means he will spend six months behind bars and a further 18 months on a supervision order, during which he will attend a sex offenders programme.

He is not allowed contact with children.

Wratten displayed little emotion as the judge read out his sentence, looking towards his wife as he was led away.

Summing up the reasons for imposing a custodial sentence, Judge Brown said anyone who took part in the evil and sordid activity of downloading child pornography had to face the fact they would go to go to prison if they got caught.

He said: "In your working life as a distinguished police officer you have held yourself up as someone who is dedicated to protecting the public. Sadly those high standards obviously lapsed once your taste for adult pornography progressed into downloading child porn."

Speaking outside the court, Detective Chief Inspector Graham Bartlett, who had been present during the raid on Wratten's Bexhill home last July, said: "The fact Christopher Wratten was a Sussex Police officer brings shame on Sussex Police, his friends, colleagues and family."

Mr Bartlett said the public could rest assured any investigation into officers would always be carried out with integrity and diligence, as it had with Wratten.

He said Wratten had shown no resistance during the raid, part of Operation Ore, and had immediately been suspended from his job, from which he later resigned.

Wratten featured in The Argus in February 2000, when he led Operation Muster, a series of drugs busts in Hastings.

He then told The Argus: "We would like to think people will realise if they don't turn up to court they cannot sleep peacefully in their beds because we will come round knocking on their doors."