Edinburgh father Lukasz Czapla who murdered his son now convicted for sickening haul of child abuse images

“This conviction is further confirmation of you moral depravity”

An evil father who was jailed for life after he brutally murdered his two-year-old son has now been convicted of possessing a shocking haul of child abuse images.

Lukasz Czapla shot, stabbed and smothered tragic tot Juliusz in a horror attack at his home in the Muirhouse area of Edinburgh in November 2020. The 43-year-old brute claimed he took the child’s life in a bid to seek revenge on the toddler’s mum Patrycja Szczesniak, who had ended the couple’s relationship months earlier. Czapla was found guilty of the murder by a jury’s majority decision in May last year. The former IT technician was caged for a minimum of 23 years.

Following his arrest for the brutal killing, police seized a computer tower belonging to Czapla that was subsequently examined by Police Scotland cyber crime officers. The computer experts found the device had folders containing 445 indecent images of children with some rated at Category A - the worst end of the scale.

The trial was held at Edinburgh Sheriff Court this week.

Czapla, originally from Gdańsk, Poland, admitted the vile images were on the computer but denied possessing and viewing them and stood trial on indictment at Edinburgh Sheriff Court this week.

The charges stated the killer had taken, or allowed to be taken, or made the indecent images of children at his former home at Muirhouse Place West, Edinburgh, between August 1, 2009 and November 21, 2020. A second charge claimed Czapla possessed the indecent images of children between the same dates.

Giving a closing speech to the court, prosecutor Joanna Waller said two cyber crime experts had given evidence stating it was “highly unlikely” the hundreds of images had been downloaded by accident. The court was told Czapla had used the search term “teens” and folder names found on his computer included “12-year-old”, “13-year-old”, “pre-teens” and “children”.

Ms Waller told the jury photos of Czapla’s driving licence, photographs of himself and letters addressed to him had been found on the hard drive which proved he was the user of the device. The fiscal depute added: “The accused was well aware [of the images] and had embarked in the deliberate act to acquire them. There is no reasonable doubt whatsoever Mr Czapla is guilty of these offences.”

Defence agent Murray Macara told the jury the police experts could not definitively say the files on the computer had been viewed by the user and that the evidence in the case was “inadequate” to convict his client. The jury deliberated for around two hours before returning majority verdicts of guilty to both charges on Tuesday afternoon.

Sheriff Julius Komorovski deferred sentence to Wednesday where he imposed a 18 month custodial sentence that will run concurrently to Czapla’s current life term. The sheriff also placed the child murderer on the Sex Offenders Register for a period of 10 years.

Sheriff Komorovski said: “Lukasz Czapla, you have been convicted of downloading and possessing indecent images of children of the most serious category. The reality is that this conviction is further confirmation of you moral depravity.”