Ron Brierley has successfully appealed his prison sentence in Sydney’s Court of Criminal Appeal.
The 84-year-old was handed a 14-month sentence last year, with a seven-month non-parole period, after he pleaded guilty to being in possession of nearly 47,000 images showing child sex abuse.
He was arrested in 2019, when he was attempting to leave Sydney Airport bound for Fiji.
Border officials discovered the images after an intensive search and more were found at his home.
Brierley entered three guilty pleas to charges in April last year and was stripped of his knighthood in May.
While his lawyers initially argued his sentence should be served in the community, Brierley was sent to prison.
On Tuesday, the Court of Criminal Appeal ruled in Brierley’s favour, but he’ll still spend time in prison.
His sentence was reduced to 10 months, and he was granted a non-parole period of four months.
Brierley was unable to attend the hearing due to a Covid lock-in at his prison and has spent around three months in custody so far.
Lawyers for the New Zealander argued there’d been assumptions made about the length of Brierley’s offending.
They also said their client had been experiencing health issues and could’ve been serving his sentence in an aged care unit.
Brierley had required hospital treatment in recent months, with his lawyers arguing his condition had only deteriorated since his last court appearance.
However, Crown lawyers argued the District Court Judge who initially heard Brierley’s case made the right call.
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