A FORMER nurse who was again caught distributing indecent images of children has been jailed for three-and-a-half years.

Paul Stevens emailed thousands of indecent images and movies of children being abused to like-minded people.

But the 66-year-old, who had been convicted of similar matters on two occasions in the past, insists he is not sexually attracted to children.

Stevens, of Chelwood Close, Chippenham, pleaded guilty to three counts of possessing and two of distributing indecent images of children.

He also admitted breaching the terms of a sexual harm prevention order imposed in 2011.

Hannah Squire, prosecuting, told Swindon Crown Court how police got intelligence that Stevens' computer was being used to access the vile material.

When they went to his house they seized his computer and tablet and found a collection of indecent pictures and films of children.

It was also uncovered that he had sent 520 emails, from two addresses, to other people who he had met in chat rooms.

She said he had also engaged in conversations online with other people where he pretended to be a 16-year-old girl.

Miss Squire said that as a result of a conviction in 2011 he put on an order banning him from using chat rooms, which he breached.

On that occasion he was jailed for four years after admitting distributing similar material and encouraging an underage girl to carry out a sex act on herself online.

He was also put on probation by magistrates ten years earlier after he was caught with indecent images of children on his computer.

Mike Pulsford, defending, said that most of the images were not in the most serious category.

Stevens would go into chat rooms with other like-minded men, he said, and receive the pictures and movies from them then send them on to other users.

He said he has a 'reluctance to accept his attraction to young children,' though accepts he has been accessing the material for 17 years.

Mr Pulsford said that his client is an intelligent man, having in the past worked as a nurse, but his marriage broke down around the time of his first conviction.

Jailing him, Judge Robert Pawson said "It can't have escaped your attention, Mr Stevens, that people like you watching and distributing images like this mean that somewhere around the world there is a seven-year-old being sexually abused.

"If it wasn't for people like you those children would not be abused, with the long term impact that has on them. You contribute directly to the sexual abuse of children.

"The suggestion you make that there is no sexual attraction to children is manifestly untrue."