Judge to deliver Russ Jones sentence on June 7

A man convicted of possessing more than 1,000 images of child sexual abuse material will receive his sentence in NWT Supreme Court next month.

Russ Jones was convicted in December 2023 of one count of possessing child pornography.

The charge carries a mandatory minimum sentence of one year’s imprisonment and a maximum of 10 years.

Justice Shannon Smallwood is set to issue Jones’s sentence on June 7.

As a sentencing hearing concluded on Friday, Crown prosecutor Morgan Fane argued Jones should serve three years in prison for the crime.

‘This is abuse without end’

Fane said the “evil root” of crimes involving child sexual abuse material is the hands-on abuse of children by people who produce it.

He said the consumption of such material leads to increased demand and normalizes the sexual abuse of children.

“This is abuse without end,” he said, adding that people are revictimized every time images of their sexual abuse are shared, downloaded or viewed.

Fane previously read five victim impact statements from people whose images had been found on Jones’s devices and from the family members of those affected.

Several expressed fear of being recognized in public and concern that painful images continue to circulate online.

“Any joy I had in life has been stolen,” the mother of two daughters wrote.

“As long as I live I can never escape what happened to me,” wrote a woman identified by the alias Erica.

Defence lawyer Jay Bran argued that his client should receive the mandatory minimum sentence of one year followed by two years’ probation with conditions including community service.

Bran said there is no evidence Jones shared the images in his possession or took steps to hide his identity. He said Jones has adhered for years to court-ordered conditions related to the charge.

Citing a pre-sentence report, Bran said Jones is Métis, grew up in a home with loving parents and six siblings, and had an “unremarkable” childhood. He said Jones has maintained steady employment, recently retiring from the NWT government after roughly 35 years.

Jones has no prior criminal record.

Fane said “these are the types of offences that tend to be undiscovered” and are committed by people “from all walks of life.”

Facts of the case

Jones, then 53 years old, was arrested in 2020 after RCMP seized his electronic devices, including several hard drives. Officers found 5,768 images on those devices that they said met the criminal definition of child pornography. (While the criminal code uses the term child pornography, many organizations and advocates say the term child sexual abuse material better reflects the abuse and exploitation of children.)

Ahead of sentencing, Jones admitted possessing 1,124 images meeting that definition but disputed another 24 images the Crown planned to submit as evidence. Justice Smallwood ruled that 21 of those images were admissible, while there was reasonable doubt that three of the images featured children under the age of 18.

Fane told the court this is the first child sexual abuse material case he is aware of that has reached trial in the NWT. In other cases he referenced, offenders pleaded guilty.

Jones did not dispute that child sexual abuse material was found on his devices, nor that he had downloaded it.

He claimed at trial that he initially came across nude photographs of children accidentally, around 2016, while searching on Bing for a beach photo. He said he saved the photos on his computer as he believed that was the only way to prove he had not searched for images of child sexual abuse.

Jones further claimed that on multiple other occasions, photos of child sexual abuse came up when he searched on Bing for unrelated innocent photos or for adult pornography. He said Bing also suggested search terms to him that produced child sexual abuse material.

Jones said he continued to save the photos to “prove Microsoft is running a child pornography site.”

Smallwood did not accept that defence.

She noted Jones had not taken steps to permanently delete all of the images from his electronic devices, had saved the photos to multiple folders on his computer, and there was evidence he had accessed some of the images after they were downloaded.