Ex-Armed Forces paedophile trawled the internet for sickening images of child sex abuse

Thomas Brankin searched for a plethora of sadistic material on a laptop computer he hid in his locked bedroom at the upmarket Inverclyde villa home he shared with his unwitting family.

Dad-of-two Brankin, 44, claimed to a jury that others — including close relatives whom he named — used his room when he was away and could easily have accessed the illegal content.

The pervert — who became a private close protection bodyguard in war-torn countries after leaving the RAF — insisted he was innocent of accessing and storing hundreds of grotesque abuse images and videos.

But it emerged during his trial at Greenock Sheriff Court that the username 'brankster-hp' — which Brankin admitted setting up himself — had been used to download all of the photos.

He also used a similar username, 'brankster666' for online work-related messaging through the Skype platform.

Brankin claimed that because there was no password on the laptop account that anyone could have used it to view the vile material that police found.

Brankin said he spent an average of only four weeks out of the year at the five-bedroom home he shared with his sister and adult niece in Wemyss Bay - but had no records to back this up.

He said he put a lock on his room door in 2017 because his sister was a 'pest' when drunk, despite having lived in the house since 2007.

Prosecutor Mark Nicol put it to Brankin: "It took you ten years to work that out?"

The pervert insisted that the room was only ever locked on one occasion when he was away in June 2018 because his niece was bringing her boyfriend to the house and none of the family knew him.

Cybercrime police officers swooped on the property on August 30 of that year and found the laptop — which Brankin had 'inherited' from a private security job in Iraq in 2008 — under his bed.

He named his nephew — who would have been aged just seven when the first images were accessed — and his step-nephew as two people who could have used the laptop when he wasn't there.

Fiscal depute Mr Nicol took Brankin through a list of key dates between 2011 and 2017 when child abuse images were viewed and stored on the computer.

The prosecutor asked him if he was working away from home on all of these dates, to which Brankin replied: "It's definitely possible, yeah."

Mr Nicol said: "But we have no records of your work to confirm this."

Brankin agreed: "No."

The court was told that Brankin's nephew would have been aged between seven and 13 on the dates in question.

Brankin bought and used three new Apple Macbook computers during the time the incriminating laptop was in his room. He said he didn't get rid of it because he had planned to refurbish it for his mother, even though she had an iPad.

Mr Nicol noted that Brankin had first intended to work on the computer in 2012, adding: "So in 2018 this was still a long-term project in your mind?"

Brankin replied: "Yeah."

Mr Nicol said: "In 2018 this computer was ten years old and you were still going to refurbish it, so is it not the case that you just kept this computer because you used it to download child abuse images?"

Brankin replied: "Not at all."

It was found that so-called 'peer-to-peer' file sharing software had been used on the computer to access more than 100 images directly from the hard drives of other computers between 2011 and 2017.

Descriptions of the material given during the trial left some jurors — viewing proceedings from the Odeon Cinema at Braehead — visibly distressed and are too disturbing to publish.

Police found more than 1,000 indecent images on the computer, made up of category A, B and C material.

The court heard that Brankin's 47-year-old sister, on being questioned by police about specific dates in March 2018, told officers in a statement: "There is no way anyone has been in Thomas's room on those dates."

The woman said in court she had 'misunderstood' some of the police questions and that officers had 'missed' parts from statement.

The jury found Brankin guilty by majority verdict last Friday of both taking, or permitting to be taken, and possession of indecent images or pseudo images of children between March 16 2011 and February 11 2018.

Sentence was deferred for reports until next month and Brankin bailed to appear.