Suspended sentence for man with child rape video on phone

A father-of-four who was sent a child pornography clip on his phone which showed a child being raped has received a one-year suspended sentence.

Prince Ajibola (50) of Castlegate Place, Adamstown, Lucan, Dublin pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to a single count of possessing the pornographic material on September 1st, 2016. He has five previous convictions including for immigration and road traffic offences.

Sergeant Martin Halpin told Karl Finnegan BL, prosecuting, that he arrested Ajibola in Terminal 1 of Dublin Airport on September 1st in relation to an unrelated investigation.

The former security guard’s two mobile phones were seized and it was later discovered that a child pornography video clip had been sent to one of his phones via the messaging platform Whatsapp on July 20th, 2016.

The court heard the clip showed a child under the age of five being raped by a man, lasting about five minutes.

Upon further investigation, gardaí­ discovered it was a clip which came from America and it had been in circulation. The male person in the clip has since been prosecuted by US authorities.

The court heard that the mobile number from which the clip had been sent was clearly identifiable.

‘Bad video’

Sgt Halpin agreed that the person who sent Ajibola the clip has pleaded guilty to the distribution of child pornography and will be sentenced next month.

Ajibola, originally from Nigeria, has been living in Ireland for 18 years and told gardaí the woman who sent him the clip wanted to show him what was going on in the world so he would not leave his children with any man.

Ajibola accepted it was a “bad video” and said he had only looked at it once to see what it was and then “shut it down”. When asked by gardaí why he kept the clip, he said he had forgotten it was on his phone.

He said he never forwarded it on to anyone and added that he had only known the woman who had sent it to him for a week, saying: “I don’t believe she had any bad intention.”

Sgt Halpin agreed with Eoin Lawlor BL, defending, that there was nothing to contradict the evidence that the woman had sent his client the clip “to warn him”.

Judge Cormac Quinn said Ajibola's mitigating factors included his early guilty plea, his remorse and cooperation with gardaí. He imposed a one year suspended sentence saying Ajibola did not "search out" the clip, download it or share it.

The court heard he will go on the sex offenders register.