25 Mar 2024
A disciplinary committee found ‘no evidence’ that a Hampshire-based vet who admitted offences relating to indecent images of children and animals had any insight into the seriousness of his crimes.
Vet Times
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A Hampshire-based vet who was found to be in possession of thousands of indecent images featuring children and animals has been struck off the RCVS register.
A disciplinary committee concluded Robert William Russell’s actions were “fundamentally incompatible with being a veterinary surgeon” and the sanction was necessary to maintain public confidence in the profession.
Reports of the case, published following a two-day hearing earlier this month, said Dr Russell had received a two-year community order at Winchester Crown Court in June last year.
He previously pleaded guilty to charges of making and possessing indecent images of children and possessing extreme pornographic material involving animals before magistrates in Southampton.
The case, for which he was also made subject to a five-year sexual harm prevention order, related to a total of 2,665 images.
Some of the children shown in the images were thought to be as young as four years old, while 109 of them related specifically to animals.
The disciplinary hearing was allowed to proceed after the committee upheld an application for it to do so when Dr Russell failed to attend.
The reports said that, although the college wrote to him about the case last August, he only responded after the matter was referred to the committee and denied committing the offences.
Although it was noted that he had denied knowledge of indecent material during an initial police search of his home in January 2020, the papers said no supporting evidence for the assertion had been presented and there was no suggestion that he had either withdrawn his guilty plea or lodged an appeal.
Committee chairperson Neil Silver said after the hearing: “The decision is not simply based on the fact that these offences were of a sexual nature but because they were repeated over a significant period of time and at a time when Dr Russell must have known, on his own plea of guilty, that what he was doing was wrong.
“Further, the committee can discern no evidence that Dr Russell has insight into the gravity of the offence he has committed.”
Dr Russell has 28 days to lodge an appeal with the Privy Council from the date he was notified of the committee’s decision.
