A PAEDOPHILE narrowly escaped jail when 18 photographs he took six years ago, of two little girls "half-dressed and naked", came to light when his canal barge was burgled, a court heard.

Pony-tailed Devryn Griffiths, 34, who lives on a barge on Macclesfield Canal, Cowbrook Lane, Bosley, admitted four counts of taking an indecent photograph of a child and one count of possessing an indecent photograph or pseudo photograph of a child when he appeared before the town's magistrates. He asked for 14 similar offences to be considered.

He was given a two year community rehabilitation order with a condition that he attends a sex offenders' programme, made him sign the Sex Offenders' Register for five years and ordered to pay £50 court costs.

Colin Winder, chairman of the bench, told the defendant: "We have considered custody, and we came very close to imposing it but have decided that it was not the best course to take."

Patrick Hutchinson, prosecuting, said that Griffiths used a Polaroid camera to take indecent images of two young girls when he was alone with them and police discovered the pictures after a burglary at the defendant's barge before Christmas last year.

"He took them while they were playing and getting changed and made efforts that no-one else saw them hiding them in various places. The pictures were of children half-dressed, undressed that sort of thing," he added.

Mr Hutchinson said the defendant kept the pictures in a little metal box. He claimed he got no sexual arousal from them but kept them to "make sure he never did anything like that again".

John Temperley, defending, said that the 18 pictures were taken in a short period of time, between 15 to 20 minutes, six years ago, and that unlike most cases involving indecent images, which usually involve thousands, the number was quite small.

He said: "At no stage did he pose or direct them. Young girls were playing around on a bed and he took the opportunity to photograph them, he didn't do anything to cause them distress, and no harm physical or otherwise came to them.

"He has had emotional difficulties over the years and is someone who has kept items to punish himself as a reminder of bad times - there are a lot of things going on under the surface that need to be explored."