0
A court clerk who watched hardcore pornography during a rape trial 'because he was bored' was caught looking at the explicit material right under the nose of the judge.
Debasish Majumder, 54, accessed the obscene images while the victim gave her harrowing evidence at Inner London Crown Court.
He looked at photographs of topless women being gagged and couples engaged in sexual acts, Kingston Crown Court was told.
However the judge, who was sitting directly behind him, spotted the filthy pictures as the prosecution evidence was being given.
Majumder, who had worked at Inner London Crown Court for a number of years, later admitted routinely watching porn while trials were taking place.
A search of his home computer found more extreme images, including child pornography.
Annabel Darlow, prosecuting, said: 'Majumder was working as a court clerk at Inner London and his conduct constituted a wholesale abuse of his position and the equipment provided in that he viewed porn sites on his court computer whilst the court was engaged in the conduct of a trial on an allegation of rape.'
He made the searches as the victim gave her evidence and throughout the prosecution case.
Judge Nigel Seed QC spotted a search list of explicit sexual language and at another point saw an image of a blonde engaged in a sex act on a man.
While he was in the courtroom, Majumder also looked at pictures of topless women gagged, it was heard.
Ms Darlow said: 'Judge Seed noticed what was taking place. He initially hoped that he had been mistaken or the behaviour would desist.
'On December 10 he did take action and drew the attention to the matter of the resident judge.'
When police investigated, they not only found pornography searches in the history of Majumbder's work computer but also child and extreme pornography images on his home computer.
Ms Darlow said: 'He had been working as a court clerk for a very considerable number of years and it could not have been more clear that using court computers to access or research pornography would have been anything other than clearest possible case of gross misconduct.
'The internet history was entirely representative of how Majumder chose to pass his days in court.'
Between December 9 and 10 2010 during the rape trial Majumder viewed roughly 30 images, the prosecution alleged.
He confessed to police it was not the first time he had used his time at work to search for porn.
Ms Darlow said: 'He said that he watched a lot of internet porn, he said that at work there were moments in his day that were boring and he would surf the net not to get access to sites but to get the titles of sites to use on his home computer and normally sites were blocked.
'He said that nobody in the court would be able to see what he was looking at on his screen apart from the judge and the judge would not be able to read the names as the print was too small.
'He said he only looked at porn if the case was boring and did so once or twice a week. He had been carrying out this type of behaviour since the December of the previous year.'
Majumder pleaded guilty to one charge of misconduct in public office and five counts of possession of indecent images.
On his home computer police found a number of pseudo porn images of children and 12 extreme porn pictures.
He had his sentencing postponed for further medical reports until later this month.
Susannah Stevens, defending, said that a stroke her client suffered roughly eight months ago could have affected his mental state.
She said: 'The stroke and Mr Majumder’s cognitive state might explain the complete breakdown of his thought processes and his ability to tell right from wrong and that is of huge importance when it comes to sentence.'
Majumder, of north London, may also face a separate hearing before sentence after he called into question the number of photos he accessed while in court.
Source
