By Sam Tobin
LONDON (Reuters) – Former British TV presenter Huw Edwards, the long-time face of the BBC’s flagship news programme, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to three counts of making indecent pictures of children.
Edwards was the BBC’s highest paid journalist and top news anchor until he quit in April, following allegations he had paid a young person thousands of pounds for sexually explicit photos, something which is unconnected to the criminal charges.
The 62-year-old was a household name in Britain for more than two decades, announcing the death of Queen Elizabeth to the nation in 2022 and leading coverage of elections, royal weddings and the 2012 Olympics.
But he has not been on TV screens for a year and Wednesday’s court appearance, which caps a dramatic fall from grace, was his first in public since then. The BBC said in a statement it was shocked by Edwards’ actions.
Edwards made his way through a throng of photographers and camera crews into London’s Westminster Magistrates’ Court, where he admitted having been sent several indecent images of children between December 2020 and August 2021.
Asked if he wished to indicate a plea to the three charges, which related to three different categories of indecent images, Edwards said: “Guilty.”
Judge Paul Goldspring said Edwards would be sentenced on Sept. 16 and that “all options”, including an immediate prison sentence, would be considered.
During the 25-minute hearing, prosecutor Ian Hope said Edwards had been sent a total of 377 sexually explicit images by an adult male on WhatsApp, 41 of which were indecent, illegal images of children.
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Hope said seven of the 41 images were of the most serious kind and that two of those seven were pornographic videos of a child possibly aged between seven and nine years old.
The last indecent image was sent to Edwards in August 2021, when the man who sent it said “the male in the film was quite young-looking and that he has more images which are illegal”, Hope said.
He added that Edwards told the male “not to send him illegal images and no more are sent from this point”, though the chat continues and further legal pornographic images were sent.
Edwards’ lawyer Philip Evans emphasised that the charges to which his client had indicated guilty pleas related only to images that were sent to him via WhatsApp.
“There is no suggestion in this case that Mr Edwards has in any way made, in the traditional sense of the word, any images in any physical way or created any images of any sort,” Evans said.
Edwards made no comment as he left the court building.
The BBC said it had been made aware of his arrest on suspicion of serious offences in November 2023, while he was already suspended over the unconnected allegations. He would have been sacked if he had been charged while still employed by the broadcaster, it said.
“There can be no place for such abhorrent behaviour and our thoughts are with all those affected,” a BBC spokesperson said.
Claire Brinton of Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service said in a statement: “Accessing indecent images of underage people perpetuates the sexual exploitation of children, which has deep, long-lasting trauma on these victims.”
(Reporting by Sam Tobin; Editing by Kate Holton, Michael Holden and Gareth Jones)
