An IT manager at a top investment firm was caught looking at child pornography while waiting to be served in a City pub.
A barmaid spotted Jeffrey Harris, 52, browsing indecent pictures of young girls on his tablet at the Crosse Keys pub in Gracechurch Street.
When he was arrested, detectives found a cache of 197 child abuse images and videos on his mobile phone and a laptop he had at home.
Harris, who used to work for City company Integrated Financial Arrangements, had also distributed some of the images online.
Edward McKiernan QC, prosecuting, told the Old Bailey: “Whilst he was being served by a staff member she saw what was on the tablet. It appeared to her to be indecent images of young girls.”
Barry Kogan QC, defending, said Harris, from Arundel, West Sussex, was lonely and turned to child porn out of curiosity when his marriage broke down.
“He had no friends at all in Seaford where he lived and he did feel isolated and lonely,” he said. “It was in these circumstances that he sought refuge in the internet.
"He was given access to dropboxes that he would download not knowing what they contained.”
Harris is now estranged from his wife and youngest son, both of whom have changed their names to avoid being associated with him, the Old Bailey heard.
Recorder Oliver Sells QC, sentencing, said: “I heard the remorse and shame you feel and the suffering of yours and those around you. I also take into account that you have begun to address these problems.”
Harris admitted 12 counts of making indecent images of a child and two counts of distributing the images.
He was given an 18-month jail sentence suspended for two years and ordered to complete a sexual offender treatment programme.
