A CCTV firm director who illegally watched the post-mortem of football ace Emiliano Sala has been jailed for 14 months.

Sherry Bray stared from the dock as Judge Peter Crabtree said her crimes caused a notable disrespect to the family of Mr Sala and Dorset man Andrew Latcham, whose autospy she also viewed.

Co-defendant Christopher Ashford was sentenced to five months imprisonment.

Sala, 28, had just signed for Cardiff City when the plane he was travelling in crashed into the English Channel, north of Guernsey, on January 21.

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His body was recovered on February 6 and a post-mortem examination took place at Bournemouth Mortuary the following day.

In the days after the post-mortem, police became aware of pictures circulating on social media apparent showing Mr Sala’s body on the mortuary table.

Last month, Sherry Bray, 49, and Christopher Ashford, 62, admitted accessing CCTV footage of Sala’s post-mortem examination.

Bray, of Charles Street, Corsham, accessed the CCTV system at Bournemouth Mortuary to watch the footballer’s post-mortem on Thursday February 7.

The following day she caused the footage to be played back and the following week deleted pictures from her mobile phone.

She also admitted watching another procedure at the same mortuary in April last year over the computer system.

On that occasion she viewed footage, either live or on playback, a post-mortem on Andrew Latcham, a grandfather whose body was found in a Dorset river that month.

She pleaded guilty to three computer misuse offences and one count of perverting the course of justice.

That charge related to her sending a message to Ashford saying ‘delete your pics’ as well as removing images from her own phone and deleting the post-mortem live feed camera facility.

Ashford, of Page Close, Calne, admitted repeatedly using the CCTV’s playback feature to watch the post mortem.

He watched the footage at 9.40pm and 11.23pm on Saturday February 9, at 2.32am and 6.58 the following day and at 1.26am and 11.35pm on Monday February 11.

Sentencing them, Judge Peter Crabtree said: “You have both accepted that your deliberate accessing of the computer system, in your case Ms Bray to watch the autopsy of Emiliano Sala live, and in both of your cases to replay the autopsy using the playback facility was, in reality, unauthorised.

“You both well appreciated that there could have been no justification based on any security grounds for doing so.

“You have both abused your positions and the access you had in quite an appalling way in watching the autopsies you have and in taking the photographs / screenshots you did.

“In assessing the level of culpability of each of you I have regard to the culture that had developed which meant, in the case of Emiliano Sala that monitoring staff and it seems others would watch, be shown images from or discuss the autopsy that had been conducted.

“Notwithstanding the fact that you knew there was no justification for doing so based on security grounds and that you both knew it would be a gross intrusion on privacy and respect for the deceased and cause considerable distress to his family if they became aware of that.”