Nathan Bake: Mechanic from Cheshire jailed for 16 years for role in child sex abuse website
A mechanic who helped run one of the dark web’s biggest child sex abuse websites has been jailed for 16 years after he was convicted under organised crime laws in the first case of its kind.
Nathan Bake, a 28-year-old tyre fitter from Runcorn, Cheshire, was the head moderator and second in command of The Annex – which had 90,000 users worldwide.
The site, where paedophiles shared millions of images – including material of the most extreme kind of abuse involving toddlers and babies – has been shut down after a global operation involving the National Crime Agency (NCA) and American law enforcement.
The man who ran the operation has been sentenced to life in prison in the US, while 14 other Americans have been charged over their roles, with eight receiving sentences of between six and 28 years.
Three British moderators charged
Three British moderators have also been charged, including former junior doctor Kabir Garg, 34, who worked as a psychiatrist for the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust. He was jailed for six years last June, while another man faces sentencing on Monday.
Kabir Garg was jailed for six years. Pic: CPS
Bake, whose username was “Pink”, was caught with a 576-page “paedophile manual” and more than 60 digital devices containing more than 800,000 images and videos of child sex abuse when he was arrested in November 2022.
He was jailed for 16 years today after he pleaded guilty to 12 charges, including child sex offences and participating in activities of an organised crime group.
Judge Patrick Thompson said he considered Bake to be a dangerous offender and ordered an extended licence period of four years.
‘Committed paedophile’
“You are a committed paedophile who represents a very significant risk of causing serious harm to children,” he told him.
“In this day and age, given the wide public access to news material, there is very little that shocks the public, but this is such a case.
“People are revulsed by offending of this nature and those who take sexual gratification from the abuse of children in any form.”
Read more from Sky News:
Mum found son in ‘blood-soaked armchair’ after ‘brutal attack’ by brother
Girl, 10, dies ‘after getting into difficulty’ in swimming pool
It is the first time the NCA has secured a conviction under the organised crime law, which investigators hoped would give the judge more scope to impose a bigger sentence.
Home Office review
There is currently no legislation that specifically deals with the moderation or administration of child sex abuse websites and the agency is in talks with the Home Office to toughen up the laws.
There are about 1.4 million users of the Tor browser, which can be easily downloaded and used to access the dark web, with around 40% of searches relating to child sex abuse, according to investigators.
Anna Pope, prosecuting, told the court The Annex was identified by American law enforcement officers on a server in Romania in 2020 before being moved to a server in Moldova.
‘Nothing was off limits’
The 30 people responsible for running the site put as much time into their work as any other job and would hold staff meetings and suggest people for promotions, said NCA branch commander Adam Priestley.
Users would have to prove themselves in “the gateway” by sharing child sex abuse material before being allowed into other areas.
“There was nothing on this site that was off limits – everything was encouraged, everything was allowed for,” he said.
“The men were very much part of a team of staff – that you would expect to see within any other business – that provided a platform to facilitate a community of paedophiles to encourage the abuse of children all over the world.”
Evasion advice
Bake answered queries from other site users and offered advice on not getting caught, saying in one post: “Come on people, show us what you’ve got for HAPPY HOUR. Show us the boys and girls that turn you on the most.”
The court heard that children’s tights, underwear and sandals were found in the bottom drawer of his computer desk, although investigators said he didn’t have any access to children.
Keith Jones, defending, said Bake was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome at the age of 16, had converted to Islam, and was studying Arabic.
“He acknowledges that his behaviour is morally reprehensible,” he said.
Zoe Ball is leaving her BBC Radio 2 breakfast show after six years.
The 53-year-old, who recently lost her mother to cancer, will present her last show on Friday, 20 December.
Ball leaves Wogan House with her replacement, Scott Mills. Pic: PA
She said she was leaving to focus on family, but will remain part of the Radio 2 team and will give further details next year.
Announcing the news on her Tuesday show, she said: “After six years of fun times alongside you all on the breakfast show, I’ve decided it’s time to step away from the early alarm call and start a new chapter.
“You know I think the world of you all, listeners, and it truly has been such a privilege to share the mornings with you, to go through life’s little ups and downs, we got through the lockdown together, didn’t we?
“We’ve shared a hell of a lot, the good times, the tough times, there’s been a lot of laughter. And I am going to miss you cats.”
Scott Mills will replace Ball on the breakfast show following her departure next month.
“Zoe and I have been such good friends now for over 25 years and have spent much of that time as part of the same radio family here at Radio 2 and also on Radio 1,” he said.
“She’s done an incredible job on this show over the past six years, and I am beyond excited to be handed the baton.”
Hugging outside the BBC building on the day of the announcement, Ball said she was “really chuffed for my mate and really excited about it”.
Ball was the first female host of both the BBC Radio 1 and Radio 2 breakfast shows, starting at the Radio 1 breakfast show in 1998, and taking over her current Radio 2 role from Chris Evans in 2020 after he left the show.
She took a break from hosting her show over the summer, returning in September.
Ahead of her stint in radio, Ball – who is the daughter of children’s presenter Johnny Ball – co-hosted the BBC’s Saturday morning children’s magazine show Live & Kicking alongside Jamie Theakston for three years from 1996.
She has two children, Woody and Nelly, with her ex-husband, DJ and musician Norman Cook, known professionally as Fatboy Slim.
Ball said in her announcement her last show towards the end of December will be “just in time for Christmas with plenty of fun and shenanigans”.
“While I’m stepping away from the Breakfast Show, I’m not disappearing entirely – I’ll still be a part of the Radio 2 family, with more news in the New Year,” she added.
“I’m excited to embrace my next chapter, including being a mum in the mornings, and I can’t wait to tune in on the school run!”
Helen Thomas, head of Radio 2, said: “Zoe has woken up the nation on Radio 2 with incredible warmth, wit and so much joy since January 2019, and I’d like to thank her for approaching each show with as much vim and vigour as if it were her first. I’m thrilled that she’ll remain an important part of the Radio 2 family.”
Mills, 51, got his first presenting role aged just 16 for a local station in Hampshire, and went on to present in Bristol and Manchester, before joining BBC Radio 1 in 1998.
He’s previously worked as a cover presenter on Radio 2, but this is his first permanent role on the station.
UK
More prisoners are being transferred to less secure jails to tackle overcrowding crisis, Sky News understands
The prison service is starting to recategorise the security risk of offenders to ease capacity pressures, Sky News understands.
It involves lowering or reconsidering the threshold of certain offenders to move them from the closed prison estate (category A to C) to the open estate (category D) because there are more free cell spaces there.
Examples of this could include discounting adjudications – formal hearings when a prisoner is accused of breaking the rules – for certain offenders, so they don’t act as official reasons not to transport them to a lower-security jail.
Prisoners are also categorised according to an Incentives and Earned Privileges (IEP) status. There are different levels – basic, standard and enhanced – based on how they keep to the rules or display a commitment to rehabilitation.
Usually ‘enhanced’ prisoners take part in meaningful activity – employment and training – making them eligible among other factors, to be transferred to the open estate.
Insiders suggest this system in England and Wales is being rejigged so that greater numbers of ‘standard’ prisoners can transfer, whereas before it would more typically be those with ‘enhanced’ status.
Open prisons have minimal security and allow eligible prisoners to spend time on day release away from the prison on license conditions to carry out work or education.
The aim is to help reintegrate them back into society once they leave. As offenders near the end of their sentence, they are housed in open prisons.
Many of those released as part of the early release scheme in October after serving 40% of their sentence were freed from open prisons.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Overcrowding in UK prisons
They were the second tranche of offenders freed as part of this scheme, and had been sentenced to five years or more.
Despite early release measures, prisons are still battling a chronic overcrowding crisis. The male estate is almost full, operating at around 97% capacity.
Read more from Sky News:
Find out what it’s really like inside prison?
Prison recalls soar as justice system struggles
Campaigners demand IPP sentences are scrapped
Sky News understands there continue to be particular pinch points across the country.
Southwest England struggled over the weekend with three space-related ‘lockouts’ – which means prisoners are held in police suites or transferred to other jails because there is no space.
One inmate is believed to have been transported from Exeter to Cardiff.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The new government inherited a prison system on the point of collapse. We took the necessary action to stop our prisons from overflowing and to protect the public.
“This is not a new scheme. Only less-serious offenders who meet a strict criteria are eligible, and the Prison Service can exclude anyone who can’t be managed safely in a category D prison.”
-
Sports2 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports8 months agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports1 year agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Environment1 year agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Sports3 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business2 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway