A former nurse has escaped spending significant time behind bars after she handed thousands of child abuse material files into police.
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"That is important and that is what is going to keep you out of jail," Justice Chrissa Loukas-Karlsson said on Tuesday while sentencing the woman in the ACT Supreme Court.
Chelsea Amalia Crivici's actions also lead to the arrest and conviction of co-offender Peter Henderson, whom she met on Tinder and eventually sent and gave her the material in question.
Crivici was handed a 15-month jail sentence, wholly suspended on the agreement she enter into an 18-month supervised good behaviour order. She has already served one day in custody.
She previously admitted to using a carriage service to transmit child abuse material, using a carriage service to possess child abuse material, and possessing child exploitation material.
The court previously heard Crivici was "trying to play cop" by keeping Henderson's hard drive containing 2146 files for five months. She has always denied having any sexual interest in children.
"You did the wrong thing to begin with but then you did the right thing," Justice Loukas-Karlsson said.
"This was a case where each offender being caught was not inevitable."
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Crivici's help to authorities was previously described as "unusual and significant in its scope". The material she handed into police depicted over 1000 individual child victims.
Previously asked why she eventually turned herself in, the woman said Henderson came to her home one night talking about something that "sounded a lot more like a plan than fantasy".
"I couldn't sit on that anymore. There was an actual, immediate danger," she said last year.
After sentencing her, Justice Loukas-Karlsson spoke to Crivici directly and said material like what she had possessed created a market for the corruption and exploitation of children.
"I want you to never forget that these are not victimless crimes," she said, as Crivici wiped away tears.
"Real children are filmed for this disgusting, appalling material. Real children's lives are destroyed for this appalling material.
"This is a black hole of the internet that nobody should touch."
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Tim Piccione
Tim is a journalist with the Canberra Times covering the ACT courts. He came to the nation's capital via the Daily Advertiser in Wagga. Contact: tim.piccione@canberratimes.com.au.
Tim is a journalist with the Canberra Times covering the ACT courts. He came to the nation's capital via the Daily Advertiser in Wagga. Contact: tim.piccione@canberratimes.com.au.
