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Langham: I considered suicide

20/11/2007

Actor Chris Langham has said he considered killing himself in the wake of being convicted on child pornography charges.

The disgraced Bafta winner was released from Elmley prison in Kent last week after his ten month sentence was reduced at the Court of Appeal.

And the actor has today insisted that while he is not a paedophile, he was "wrong" to have looked at the images that led to his conviction.

"I have never registered with a site, and I've never been a member of a paedophile ring and I've never communicated with anyone with an interest in that sort of thing," he said.

Langham was first arrested in November 2005 after child pornography videos were discovered on his computers at his home in Cranbrook, Kent.

The arrest came as the actor was at the height of his fame after receiving critical acclaim and multiple awards for his role in BBC satirical comedy The Thick of It.

Talking to Sky News today, the 58-year-old told presenter Anna Botting he had accessed the child pornography images so as to tell the story of abused children with a "responsible and caring attitude".

He said: "There is an assumption that if you look at images like this, therefore you must have a sexual interest in children and it's an odd logic because one of the reasons was I wanted to write about it.

"I passionately care about the welfare of children," he added.

He explained that he was fearful that he would see himself being abused when he viewed the images.

"The guy who abused me had a cine-camera so when I accessed those images, the four images that I saw, there was always the thought in my mind, 'I wonder if it's going to be me'."

But while he downloaded 15 images, he only looked at four, he explained, adding: "I only ever saw the first few seconds of them because I couldn't bear it. I found it too upsetting and distasteful and disturbing."

Though he told Ms Botting that he now has "no money" due to the lengthy court case, he revealed that he has already been contacted regarding an acting role.