Man behind child-abuse empire behind bars

Matthew David Graham started peddling depraved child-abuse material at the tender age of 19 and he wanted his vile online empire to become the largest in the world.

Operating under the pseudonym "Lux", he showed no empathy for the vulnerable children tortured and raped in footage he shared from his Melbourne bedroom with glee.

Skinny and pale-faced Graham will spend the next 10 years in jail, where he is abhorred even by pedophiles.

Judge Michael Tinney, sentencing the 23-year-old on Thursday, said there was no other case like his.

"You were, in fact, a world player seeking to exercise influence and actually achieving influence on like-minded people in this country and around the world from the comfort of your bedroom in South Morang," he told Graham in the County Court of Victoria.

A socially withdrawn Graham operated his sophisticated network via the dark web, which he came across when he retreated into his room at his parents' home in 2012.

The empire of "pure evil" he created over the next two years was judged by law enforcement officials to be one of the biggest in the world, with some of the worst content.

Graham pleaded guilty to 13 child exploitation charges, including one related to him advising a Russian man how to rape and murder a five-year-old girl.

He published how-to-make child pornography guidelines and instructed the carer of a disabled child overseas what to film when he abused the girl.

Graham also shared, with great fanfare, a four-part video, which showed a toddler being tied up, gagged and burnt among other horrific acts.

Judge Tinney, forced to watch that, said it was the worst thing he had ever seen.

"An infant, totally trusting, totally dependent, totally helpless, is tortured," he said.

Graham, who was not actually producing the vile images himself, told police he wanted to be "the biggest and the best".

He also taunted the FBI, at one point writing: "Well, it looks like this empire hasn't fallen just yet. To any law enforcement agencies reading this, f*** you."

Diagnosed with a schizoid personality disorder, Graham was disconnected from the suffering of the children, as though he were "from another planet", the court heard.

Graham's parents, who stand by him, could not have imagined in their wildest dreams the evil and twisted life he was leading from the confines of his bedroom, Judge Tinney said.

He accepted Graham had now shown some remorse.

Graham was sentenced to 15 years and six months in prison but will be eligible for parole after a decade.

He has already served some 570 days in jail.