Man who admitted to hoarding 100GB of child sexual abuse material spared jail

A man who admitted to possessing around 100 gigabytes of child sexual abuse material has been spared an effective prison term, after a court found “special and extraordinary” reasons to go below the minimum punishment set by law.

Alvinleigh Hili, a software developer from Fgura, was handed a two-year prison term suspended for four years by Magistrate Franco Agius. He was also placed under a four-year treatment order and a four-year supervision order. His name will also be entered in the register of sex offenders.

Hili had registered an unconditional admission in March to charges of producing, distributing or otherwise making available indecent and extreme material of children under nine, including material depicting bestiality, brutality, sadism or torture, as well as possessing and knowingly accessing such material through information technology.

The court heard that, in February 2025, police received a report from the Child Sexual Exploitation Unit flagging that child abuse material had been downloaded and uploaded on the night of February 4 through an IP address that was traced to Hili’s family home.

Police raided the home at 7.28am on February 26 and initially arrested the father, as the internet connection was registered in his name. Officers seized several devices, including pen drives, hard drives, mobile phones and laptops.

A forensic analysis later established that the illegal material was stored on a hard disk installed in the accused’s own computer, in his bedroom.

Hili presented himself to police headquarters voluntarily on March 15, accompanied by his lawyer Robert Galea, but he chose not to answer any questions.

Inspector Warren Chris Muscat told the court the material had been shared through torrent software. He explained that uploading is an automatic and unavoidable part of how torrents work while a file is downloading. There was no evidence that Hili had deliberately sent material to any specific person or shared it on social media.

‘Stunted development’

Psychologist Graziella Zammit, who saw Hili 18 times, testified that he had contacted her for help before he was arraigned.

She said Hili was a man with low self-esteem, who found it difficult to form adult romantic relationships. She described his psychological development as stunted, saying he had become desensitised after spending years using adult pornography.

She also said Hili had been accessing child abuse material for only around four months before reaching out for help, and his access was not constant.

Hili also resigned from his job in the gaming sector because his contract obliged him to inform his employer if charged with a criminal offence. She said this was evidence of shame and remorse.

Probation officer Julia Farrugia, who was tasked with drawing up a social inquiry report and a pre-sentencing report, recommended a suspended sentence with supervision, noting the accused’s stable home life, clean drug tests and consistent engagement with treatment.

‘Special and extraordinary reasons’

In its reasoning, the court referred to the COPINE scale to determine the severity of the child abuse imagery. It found that at least part of the imagery discoveredon Hili’s devices fell within categories four, six and seven – the latter involving explicit sexual activity between children. The court said its gravity “cannot be minimised”.

The aggravated first charge carries a minimum punishment exceeding two years’ imprisonment.

However, the court invoked Article 21 of the Criminal Code, which allows a punishment below the legal minimum in “special and extraordinary reasons” that must be spelled out in the judgement.

Those reasons, according to the magistrate, were: that Hili had sought therapy voluntarily before being arraigned, that his engagement with treatment was consistent and concrete rather than superficial, and that the professional reports pointed to a real potential for behavioural change and risk reduction with structured intervention.

The court stressed that these factors do not diminish the gravity of the offences . Rather, a structured treatment plan under judicial supervision would be more successful than an effective prison term in addressing the risks identified by the experts.

The magistrate ordered that a copy of the judgement be sent to the Attorney General and the Director of Probation Services.