A St. Albert man has been given two years in prison for photographing children in swimming pools and change rooms, including Servus Credit Union Place.
Stephen Thomas Deighton, 46, appeared in an Edmonton courtroom Jan. 7 and received his sentencing for charges of making and possessing child pornography and voyeurism.
Deighton was charged in 2011 after he was pulled over for impaired driving in Fort McMurray.
The tow truck driver who was taking the vehicle to the impound lot noticed a denim-wrapped camera in the SUV and became suspicious. He found photos of young girls in various states of undress on the camera and contacted RCMP.
Police then seized computers and electronic storage media from Deighton’s Fort McMurray home as well as a home he had access to in St. Albert.
They recovered photographs and videos of children at swimming pools and in changing rooms at five Alberta recreational facilities including West Edmonton Mall’s World Waterpark, Millennium Place in Sherwood Park, MacDonald Island Park in Fort McMurray and Southland Leisure Centre in Calgary.
The offences took place between 2005 and 2011. The majority of the victims were girls between the ages of three and 15 years old.
In addition to serving two years in prison, the father of four will be on two years of probation with strict conditions. Deighton is banned from any location where children under the age of 18 are known to frequent such as recreation facilities, parks and schools.
He is also prohibited from being in the company of anyone under the age of 16 unless accompanied by an adult. He is banned from owning any device that can store or capture video or photographs.
The former Fort McMurray management consultant must submit a DNA sample to the national criminal databank and will be registered under the National Sex Offender Registry for the next 20 years.
Upon being released from custody in October 2011, Deighton was banned from all St. Albert recreation facilities.
