THE former owner of one West Somerset's most historic inns had so many pornographic pictures and films on his computers that police had to stop counting, a court heard. At least 109,032 images of children and 1,077 indecent movies were discovered when officers went to the 12th century Royal Oak at Winsford with a warrant, Taunton Crown Court was told. When the count got to that figure it was stopped, said Alan Large, prosecuting. The images ranged from 100,000 "plus" of the least-serious category one, to 4,557 category two, 1,643 category three, 2,804 category four, and 28 the most serious category five. The movies went from 427 category one to 343 category two, 49 category three, 247 category four, and 11 category five. One film was over an hour long. Former computer programmer and IT manager Michael Ashman, aged 40, who is married with a daughter, admitted 15 charges of making an indecent photograph of a child and was jailed for 15 months. He told officers he was more interested in 15 to 17- year-old girls, and downloaded images sporadically, although it tended to relate to when he was stressed. They were created over nine years and some images were of boys. When told the number they had found, he said he had no idea there were so many. Patrick Mason, defending, said Ashman's life had been completely shattered - not only by the charges but by a series of financial disasters which had left him and his parents desperately trying to keep solvent: "He's brought his parents down as well," he added. He had suffered five redundancies in the IT industry before borrowing a huge amount of finance from a bank and setting up business with a partner who disappeared with all the equipment. They had got less than expected from the Royal Oak and he had lost his wife and daughter: "Against that background, he fell back on a strange desire to look at these pictures. "We don't know how the police got on to him. He was not sharing the images or distributing them but he did have contacts with some people on the internet and maybe some of them gave information to the police," said Mr Mason. Since breaking up with his family, he had been living with a friend near Bridgwater. Judge Stephen O'Malley said the offences had brought Ashman's family life to an end. He was passing a sentence which marked the gravity of the offences and the public distaste for what he had done in the hope of discouraging others. He added: "The message must go out to others that if child pornography is taken off the internet in any significant quantity the courts will send the offenders to prison." Child porn pictures The sentence was "significantly reduced" by his plea of guilty, and other mitigating factors were that the images were only for his own use and were stored where they could not be seen by other members of his family. The judge ordered the forfeiture and destruction of all the computer equipment in the case. Ashman was also told to sign the Sex Offenders Register for ten years and was disqualified indefinitely from working with children.