Edwards has been involved in an online chat with an adult man, who sent him sexual images, including indecent images of children.
Ex-BBC newsreader Huw Edwards on Wednesday pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children.
Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London heard the 62-year-old journalist admit to committing three offences between December 2020 and April 2022.
Edwards had 41 photographs on the messaging app WhatsApp, with seven being category A images—the most serious kind—mostly of children aged 13 to 15.
Twelve category B pictures and 22 category C images were also found on Edwards’s WhatsApp account.
According to prosecutors, there were also moving images of a young child, around the age of 7 to 9.
Arrest and Charges
Edwards was arrested on Nov. 8, 2023 and was charged with making indecent images of children in June. He resigned from the BBC in April on medical grounds.
The court heard on Wednesday that Edwards had been involved in an online chat with an adult man on WhatsApp between December 2020 and August 2021, who sent him 377 sexual images. Of these 41 were indecent images of children.
Most of them—36 files—were sent during a two-month period.
In February 2021, the man asked Edwards whether the files he was sending contained images of people who were too young, the court heard. The ex-BBC employee asked the man not to send anything illegal.
The court was told that the pair continued to exchange legal pornographic images until April 2022.
According to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), “making” indecent and prohibited images of children can include receiving an image via social media, even if unsolicited and even if part of a group.
Claire Brinton of the CPS said in a statement on Wednesday, “Accessing indecent images of underage people perpetuates the sexual exploitation of children, which has deep, long-lasting trauma on these victims.”
The CPS and the Metropolitan Police were able to prove that Edwards was receiving illegal material involving children via WhatsApp, Brinton said in the statement.
“This prosecution sends a clear message that the CPS, working alongside with the police, will work to bring to justice those who seek to exploit children, wherever that abuse takes place,” Brinton added.
Defence
Edwards’s barrister Philip Evans, KC told the court: “There’s no suggestion in this case that Edwards has … in the traditional sense of the word, created any image of any sort.”
Evans added that Edwards “did not keep any images, did not send any to anyone else, and did not and has not sought similar images from anywhere else.”
The defence also said that the ex-newsreader had experienced “both mental and physical” health issues and “was not just of good character, but of exceptional character.”
Edwards is one of the most well-known faces on British television.
PA Media contributed to this report.