A SEX offender who made hundreds of porn-ographic images of children was warned that he faces prison if he steps out of line.

Michael Raymond Keepax, 61, of Magdalen Lane, Bridport, was sentenced for 15 counts of making indecent images of children, more than two years after police raided his home.

Keepax was given a community order in March 2008 for 15 separate charges of possessing indecent images of children.

He was brought before Dorchester Crown Court again because of the length of time it took police experts to analyse computer files found on Keepax’s PC at the time of the raid.

Prosecutor Jennie Rickman said: “This defendant was arrested in February 2008 as the result of a search warrant.

“Hard copy images were found at the time of children. At the time of seizing these, his computer was seized. He was sentenced in March 2008 to a three-year community order.”

All of the photos seized by police were graded between the severity levels of one and three, with grade five being the most serious. One of the charges related to as many as 906 images on Keepax’s computer.

Probation officer Laura Phoenix said Keepax had completed a sex offenders’ rehabilitation programme and had returned to live in the family home.

Sentencing Keepax to a 12-month community order with a supervision requirement, Recor-der Christopher Parker said: “There are slightly unusual circumstances which led to your being charged with these offences.

“When you were originally arrested you were found in possession of hard copy images of level four.

“You pleaded guilty to a number of offences related to files found in your computer at the same time and analysed at a much later date.

“You have pleaded guilty to 15 counts, all of which are images of children at level three and below.

“If these images had been received at the same time as the hard copy images then you would have been sentenced at the same time.”

Recorder Parker also gave Keepax a 12-month prohibited activity requirement and ordered that he had no unsupervised contact with children under 18.

He warned: “If you fail to comply with these requirements you will be brought back to this court and re-sentenced and that’s likely to include time in custody.”