Bulger killer Jon Venables jailed over child porn

Only the judge who sentenced the 27-year-old at the Old Bailey yesterday was able to see him on a video link after a secret ruling earlier this week that he would not be shown to the court.

Mr Justice Bean dismissed an application from the media that Venables' current identity, put in place following his release in 2001, should be made public.

But for the first time it can be revealed that Venables was living in Cheshire when he offended.

Venables had been looking at child pornography on his home-made computer for more than two years and in 2008 posed online as "Dawn" the mother of an eight-year-old girl to pass images to another paedophile.

Venables said he enjoyed looking at the images and was "breaking the last taboo."

He admitted downloading 57 indecent photographs of children between February 2009 and February this year, including eight images at level four, a second charge of distributing three indecent photographs between February 1-23 this year and a new third charge, added this week, of distributing 42 indecent photographs to paedophile Leslie Norman Blanchard.

The only words heard from him were "yes" and "guilty" three times to the charges.

Jailing him the judge said "Accessing child pornography on a computer is not a victimless crime since people who do it encourage the exploitation of the children who are filmed or photographed."

He said even Venables' counsel accepted downloading such images "is itself a form of child abuse".

But he said it would be wrong to increase the sentence because he was one of the two people who carried out the horrific murder of the two-year-old.

"But there is a significant difference between your case and that of a typical offender, since he would not be released after serving half his sentence."

His release date would be for the Parole Board.

Venables was also ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years and barred from working with children.

After the hearing Jamie's mother Denise Fergus who sat in court wearing a Justice for James badge, condemned the sentence as "simply not enough."

In a statement read outside the Old Bailey, Chris Johnson said on her behalf: "We have been in court this morning and once again we have had to sit through proceedings where justice has not been done.

"These were very serious offences and two years is simply not enough to meet the gravity of what this person did.

"We are surprised and concerned that he was not recalled under the terms of his parole licence when he committed an offence in 2008."

Mr Johnson added that they would be raising the issue with Justice Secretary Ken Clarke.

Venables, whose solicitor said he thought every day about the events of 1993 and wanted to apologise for what he had done, succeeded in keeping an injunction in place preventing his new identity and former address being revealed.

His counsel said Venables would be in danger if his identity was known, with numerous death threats having been made.

Edward Fitzgerald QC, for Venables, also told the court his client had resorted to drink and drugs because of the stress and isolation of his situation living in fear of being discovered.

"He has undergone vilification, demonisation and threats to his life of exceptional intensity over the years and they continue today."