Matthew Cooper, 61, who once served on Trimingham Parish Council and chaired a local fundraising committee, installed a hidden camera in the bathroom of his Mundesley Road property.
Norwich Crown Court heard that the device recorded guests “doing private acts, mainly showering,” between April 2008 and March 2023. Among those filmed were two boys who cannot be identified for legal reasons.
Prosecutor Chris Youell said Cooper even recorded himself in the shower, demonstrating how much “sexual gratification” he derived from his actions. The recordings were discovered when police raided his home after being alerted by the National Crime Agency to indecent material uploaded online.
Officers seized multiple devices containing hundreds of child sexual abuse images, including 60 category A files, the most serious type and online messages in which Cooper “fantasised” about children with other offenders.
The mother of one of the child victims told the court her family’s life had been “shattered”, adding her son could no longer use a bathroom without checking for hidden cameras.
Recorder Simon Taylor KC sentenced Cooper to 28 months in prison, describing the crimes as “serious offending of a very intimate sort”. He said the case highlighted how “awful and destructive” indecent image offences are, stressing that “real children suffer at the other end of the camera”.
Cooper, who walks with a stick and suffers from ill-health, was also made subject to a 10-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order, placed on the sex offenders’ register for 10 years, and banned from contacting one victim or his mother.
