A 48-year-old Co Mayo man has been given a two-year suspended sentence, after pleading guilty to possessing images of child abuse.
Hugh Condren, with an address at Brookville Avenue, Swinford, had a total of 109 images uploaded to a cloud storage website.
The accused, who is a health care assistant and a member of the Garda Reserve, was said to "have lost his way in a temporary catastrophic fashion" at the time the offences occurred.
Detective Martin Mitchell said the existence of the material was notified to gardaí by the (US-based) National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.
Des Dockery, senior counsel, told the Castlebar Circuit Criminal Court that the accused had resigned from both the health service and the Garda Reserve.
Judge Seán O'Donnabhaín said he was prepared to accept that events happened at a time when the accused had lost his way and that he has now disengaged from such activity.
He said that notwithstanding the seriousness of the offence he was satisfied there was a low risk of re-offending.
He imposed a two-year prison sentence, fully suspended on condition the accused continues to engage with a psychiatrist and obeys her directions.
