The ongoing case into a 21 year old who is currently remanded in custody on a number of sexual offences with a child has heard how the pressures on the PSNI's Cyber Crime Unit has led to delays in development of the case.

Shannon Griffin, of no fixed abode, has been in custody since his arrest for several charges.

He is charged with, between June 1 2017 and February 2 2018, sexual communication with a child, intentionally caused a child under 16 years, to engage in a sexual activity, meet a child following sexual grooming, intentionally engaged in a sexual activity for the purpose of obtaining sexual gratification, made an unwarranted demand of indecent images from a female child below the age of 18 with menaces and made, possessed and distributed indecent photographs of a child,

Griffin appeared by videolink from Hydebank Prison as the court heard how three devices had been examined.

Updating the court, the prosecution said the devices had significant images of sexual abuse and sexual communications with a child with one of the communications being blackmail in which he threatening the victim that if they did not send more images he would release the images he already had.

The prosecution did admit that progress in the development of the case had been slow but this was down to a number of different reasons which included the images having to be examined and categorised.

The court heard that the majority of the images were in Category C, the lowest category.

The case has been triaged and is currently 10th on the list. They said that beyond that they did not know when the report would be available.

The prosecution added that the investigating officer had been doing their utmost to speed up the process and is putting pressure on the Cyber Crime unit to speed up their investigation process.

Griffin's solicitor asked the court to keep a close eye on the matter but accepted that there are pressures on the Cyber Crime Unit.

Judge Renahan said it was "unfortunate that matters were drifting" but felt that although Cyber Crime has a lot of work to handle, this case could be prioritised suggesting the investigating officer have an urgent conversation with officers in the Cyber Crime Unit.

The case was adjourned for a full update on October 22 with Griffin again due to appear via videolink.