Jail for filming mum and daughter

A MAN filmed a young girl and her mother while they used his portable shower during a camping trip, a court has been told.

Rodney Paul Howell, 50, created the videos during camping trips to Double Island Point, north of the Sunshine Coast, with the family between 2005 and 2008.

Prosecutor David Nardone told the Brisbane District Court on Thursday Howell had befriended the family while living near them in Brisbane. He allowed them to use his portable gas shower at the campsite, where he secretly taped the 11-year-old girl and her mother undressing and washing themselves.

The court was told he made another video of the girl using the shower the following year when she was around 12 years old.

Mr Nardone said Howell’s voyeurism was discovered when the girl’s stepfather was staying at his home, and discovered a CD containing the footage.

The disc also contained a fourth video of two other girls taking a shower during one of the camping trips. Police searched Howell’s home and seized 13 discs containing 163 child exploitation images.

He was arrested in March last year, and pleaded guilty on Thursday to three counts of making child exploitation material, and one each of observations or recordings in breach of privacy and possessing child exploitation material.

Judge Brian Devereaux sentenced him to 15 months’ jail and ordered Howell be released on probation after serving four months.