Former BBC news presenter Huw Edwards has been sentenced to six months’ imprisonment suspended for two years by a London court for having indecent images of children, according to PA Media.
The suspended sentence comes with requirements including the completion of a sex offender treatment program and 25 rehabilitation sessions.
Edwards, who was the BBC’s highest-paid journalist, pleaded guilty in July to having 41 indecent images of children.
Chief magistrate Paul Goldspring said while sentencing Edwards that it was “obvious” that the journalist was “very highly regarded by the public” until information about his crimes became public.
“It is not an exaggeration to say your long-earned reputation is in tatters,” the magistrate said.
The court had previously heard that Edwards had engaged in online chat with an adult man on WhatsApp, who sent him 377 sexual images, 41 of which were indecent images of children.
The adult man who sent Edwards the images is a convicted pedophile, the court heard on Monday. Edwards sent him hundreds of pounds “apparently off the back of (him) sending pornographic images,” prosecutor Ian Hope said.
Defense barrister Philip Evans KC said that the journalist “did not make payments in order for images to be sent to him, and he certainly did not make payments in order that indecent images would be sent to him.”
Seven of the images shared with Edwards were of the most serious type of indecent images of children under English law. Most of the children featured in them were estimated to be between 13 and 15 years old. One child was aged between seven and nine.
The alleged offenses were committed between December 2020 and August 2021, according to the Crown Prosecution Service of England and Wales.
The court previously heard that Edwards told a man on WhatsApp not to send him underage images after the man asked if the images he was sending were too young. No more illegal images were sent after that message, the court heard, but the pair were said to continue exchanging legal pornographic images until April 2022.
Evans, the defense lawyer, said Monday that Edwards “did not gain any gratification” from the indecent images, adding that the journalist is “truly sorry he has committed these offenses.”
“He recognizes the repugnant nature of such indecent images and the hurt that is done to those who appear in such images,” Evans added. “For his part in that, he apologizes sincerely.”
Face of the BBC
Edwards presented both the News at Six and the BBC’s flagship News at Ten – equivalent to the anchor of a network evening news program in the US. He announced the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022 and was regularly the face of BBC News specials.
The anchor was suspended from the BBC in July 2023 and was arrested four months later, but only stepped down from his role in late April this year.
He was kept on the BBC’s payroll during this time, receiving £200,000 (nearly $264,000) in the months between his arrest and his resignation. The BBC, which is predominantly funded by UK households via a license fee, asked Edwards to hand back that portion of his salary.
The UK’s Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has also said the money should be returned.
The broadcaster’s governing board said in August that Edwards pleaded guilty to “an appalling crime.”
“He has clearly undermined trust in the BBC and brought us into disrepute,” the board said.
