A ‘classic peeping tom’ filmed women and girls getting undressed with a secret spy camera and used an AI bot to create naked photos of underage girls from ‘innocent’ social media posts, a court has heard.
Thomas Milton, 32, has been jailed for three years after he was found guilty of five counts of voyeurism.
Durham Crown Court heard he hid a spy camera he had bought off a TikTok shop in the changing rooms and recorded women and teenage girls, as young as 14, without their knowledge.
Milton, who admitted making indecent pseudo-photographs of children, also filmed two women in their homes.
Charlie Thompson, prosecuting, said Milton, who worked as a technician, was caught after the camera he set up was found in the changing rooms.
During his trial, he claimed he hid the camera for the ‘thrill’ and said it was not for sexual gratification – something sentencing Judge Richard Bennett said was ‘palpable nonsense’.
Teesside Crown Court heard on Monday, December 15, how Milton hid the same camera in a woman’s bedroom twice and on one occasion captured the woman removing all of the clothing on her lower half.
Taking the stand to read her victim impact statement, she said: ‘It doesn’t feel real. I felt sick, violated and utterly disgusted. I still get flashbacks.
‘I was unable to sleep and eat for weeks and became very unwell. I will never forgive him for what he has done.’
Teesside Crown Court heard how on three separate occasions he harvested ‘innocent’ photographs from social media of clothed teenage girls and asked AI software to make them naked.
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Sentencing Milton, who appeared in court via video link from Home House Prison, Judge Bennett said: ‘Your full name is Thomas, you were known as Tom.
‘You are the classic Peeping Tom who spies on young women and teenage girls for your own sexual gratification.
‘You are clearly highly intelligent but equally manipulative, deviant and dishonest.’
Milton, of Clive Road, Eston, was jailed for three years and made subject to a sexual harm prevention order for the rest of his life, restricting his contact with children and internet and social media use.
Judge Bennett added: ‘Your use of AI in this offending highlights the real danger of posting innocent images of children on social media, which can be manipulated by people who have a sexual interest in children.’
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