British businessman faces 12 years in jail over child porn internet swap

Dr Alan Hesketh, who has homes in the Isle of Man and Gerrard's Cross, Bucks, faces up to 12 and a half years in jail after admitting one charge of receiving, possessing and distributing child pornography.

The 61-year-old father of four was fired from his job as pharmaceutical giant Pfizer's global patents director after his arrest by US immigration customs agents at New York's John F Kennedy Airport in March.

Thin, bespectacled Hesketh has been held in jail ever since and was brought into the Bridgeport, Connecticut, court in handcuffs wearing green prison overalls.

Dr Alan Hesketh faces up to 12-and-a-half years in jail after swapping pornographic images of children with paedophiles over the net. File photo

He is accused of posing as a 28-year-old woman in online chat rooms while trading images of children engaged in sick sexual acts.

Using the name 'suzbibaby',  he sent and received the images from his £500,000 house in wealthy Stonington, Connecticut, and from an internet address registered at Pfizer's Manhattan headquarters.

Mr Hesketh's blonde wife, Jan, wearing a blue pattered summer dress, and one of their sons watched from the front row of the public gallery as Birkhenhead-born Hesketh was brought before Judge Warren Eginton.

Hesketh is understood to own several properties in the Isle of Man as well as homes in New York and Connecticut worth millions of pounds.

He turned around several times and smiled at his wife of 39 years before the hearing and appeared poised and calm throughout the hour-long case, answering 'yes, your honour' to questions from the judge.

The court heard that Hesketh, who worked as a patents lawyer in the UK before moving to America seven years ago, had traded 1,067 images with a man from Buffalo, New York, of children engaged in sexually-explicitly conduct with adults.

The two had also discussed molesting children in a series of email exchanges.

When he was arrested at JFK, he had 1,981 pictures and seven video films stored in his computer memory stick and another 315 images on his laptop.

Reading out the charge, Judge Eginton said: 'The children were under the age of 12 and involved in sadistic and masochistic acts.'

Debra Slater, prosecuting, said the child advocacy group, Just For All, had managed to trace some of the children, who had been reported missing by their parents.

Several of those could give statements to the judge before Hesketh is sentenced on October 17.

The judge warned Hesketh that he could expect fines of up to £125,000 as well as a lengthy jail sentence.

Once freed, he will be placed on the American sex offenders' register and prohibited from working with children under the age of 18 or loitering at playgrounds or schools.

The judge said he would probably be deported back to Britain once he had served his jail sentence.

Hesketh was denied bail when he first appeared in court but his lawyer, Jonathan Einhorn, said he intended to apply for Hesketh to be held under house arrest at his Connecticut home at a special bail hearing on Monday.

Mrs Hesketh also appeared poised during the hearing. Asked outside if she had anything to say, she said: 'Not at the moment, thank you.'