Bolten was arguing in the District Court last week for a reduction in Power’s 15 month sentence for possessing child pornography.

Power’s personal computer was found to contain 433 photos and 31 videos of child pornography during routine maintenance last year.

Power pleaded guilty in January and was sentenced in to 15 months jail last month with a non-parole period of at least eight months.

Bolten argued that the chief magistrate of the lower court had accepted a series of psychiatric evaluations stating that Power had suffered from chronic depression since the 1970s but had disregarded the substantive weight of the assessments because Power was a senior lawyer for the Crown.

Although Power was able to function in his daily duties as a prosecutor he suffered from a chronic depressive disorder, Bolten said.

Bolten said a person who had a mental disorder could not be as “morally culpable or criminally culpable” when involved in illegal activities.

He added that Power’s condition was apparent to friends and colleagues, even though he had the ability to perform his job as a senior prosecutor.

“Coping at work, doing his job as best he could ... but the rest of his life was in serious disarray ... and seen by many as barely coping,” Bolten told the court.

He said it was not an issue of determining right from wrong, but an inability by Power to put a stop to his addiction to downloading pornography from the internet.