Welcome to the official web site of the Government of the Pitcairn Islands. 
 
 
 
 The Pitcairn Islands group is a British Overseas Territory. It comprises the islands of Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno. Pitcairn, the only inhabited island, is a small volcanic outcrop situated in the South Pacific at latitude 25.04 south and longitude 130.06 west. It is roughly 2170km (1350 miles) east south-east of Tahiti and just over 6600km (4100 miles) from Panama. The Islands' administrative headquarters are situated in Auckland New Zealand, 5310km (3300 miles) away.With a population of only around fifty, the people of Pitcairn are descended from the mutineers of HMAV Bounty and their Tahitian companions. Pitcairn Island is approximately 3.2km (2 miles) long and 1.6km (1 mile) wide with the capital Adamstown located above Bounty Bay and accessed by the aptly named road, "The Hill of Difficulty". ||||| Michael Warren, who downloaded more than 1000 images of child abuse while working in child protection, will serve his sentence on the tiny Pacific island 
 
 The former mayor of Pitcairn Island has been sentenced to 20-months in prison after he was convicted of possessing more than 1000 images and videos depicting child pornography. 
 
 The tiny British territory in the South Pacific, which has a population of around 50 people, gained international notoriety in 2004 when seven of the island’s 12 men were accused of a total of 55 sex crimes, some dating back 40 years. 
 
 Pitcairn mayor charged with possessing child abuse material wants to face 'local law' Read more 
 
 According to crown prosecutor Kieran Raferty, former mayor Michael Warren - who served as the island’s mayor from 2008 to 2013 - began downloading images of child abuse in 2004. 
 
 During the years Warren downloaded the images he was working in child protection on the island - and travelling to New Zealand and the United Kingdom in an official capacity for further training in child protection. 
 
 Raferty said Warren’s initial defence was that he had downloaded the images because he wanted to understand child pornography after the 2004 sex abuse cases. 
 
 Warren has also been found guilty of engaging in an internet “sex chat” with a person purporting to be a 15-year-schoolgirl, and of possessing a video that showed a bound and gagged naked woman. 
 
 Warren will begin serving prison time when New Zealand police officers arrive on the island, which could take up to six months. 
 
 Map of Pitcairn Island Map of Pitcairn Island 
 
 It is not known whether he will be detained on the island’s specially-built prison, which was constructed by islanders found guilty of sex crimes with material shipped out from Britain in kit form. If he is kept in the facility, he is likely to be the only inmate, and would effectively be serving his sentence in solitary confinement. 
 
 Since the sexual abuse scandals of 2004, Pitcairn has been trying to rehabilitate its community and attract people to the island - which could not survive without immigrants or more children born on the island. 
 
 ||||| Pitcairn Island, one of the remotest communities in the world, is embroiled in another controversy involving underage sexual activity after its former mayor was found guilty of possessing more than 1,000 images and videos depicting child abuse — the eighth man out of a total male population of around 12 to be accused of sex crimes involving children. 
 
 Michael Warren, who served as mayor of the tiny South Pacific island from 2008 to 2013, could become the only inmate in the island's prison, after being handed a 20-month sentence by a court in New Zealand for charges stemming back as far as 2004. 
 
 That year, the island — which has a total population of around 50 — made international headlines after seven of its 12 men were accused of 55 sex crimes against underage girls as young as seven. Six were found guilty of crimes which stretched back more than 20 years. 
 
 Warren was working in child protection on the island throughout the period he was downloading the images, and traveling in an official capacity to both New Zealand and the United Kingdom for training in the field, reported the Guardian. 
 
 The images were reportedly found in Warren's possession in May 2010, after he accidentally sent an email to a diplomatic staff member from an address in someone else's name. That address was found to be linked to an online chat site containing explicit images. 
 
 Because of the remoteness of the island, which sits roughly halfway between New Zealand and Chile, and a series of legal challenges that saw Warren successfully resist facing justice in New Zealand, he was not formally charged until last month. 
 
 Warren initially defended his possession of the images by saying he was trying to better understand child pornography in the wake of the 2004 convictions, according to Radio New Zealand. His lawyer Tony Ellis subsequently argued the images found in Warren's possession were "comparatively moderate" when compared to other cases and taken in the context of an island community with limited adults where most of the women were in relationships, according to Radio New Zealand. 
 
 However, a New Zealand Police investigation found Warren had engaged in sexually explicit online activity with a girl he believed to be 15 years old at the time. 
 
 Along with three other volcanic islands, Pitcairn Island forms Britain's last remaining Pacific overseas territory. A treaty between New Zealand, Britain and Pitcairn allows for legal proceedings to be conducted in New Zealand, which also provides law enforcement assistance to the island. 
 
 Related: New Zealand Supreme Court Rejects Kiribati Man's Bid to Become a 'Climate Refugee' 
 
 It is not yet known whether Warren will serve his sentence as the only inmate at the island's prison facility, which was constructed in 2004 by the men found guilty of sex crimes against young girls. 
 
 Those charges resulted in sentences ranging from community service to six years' imprisonment for the defendants, who included then-Mayor Steve Christian and his son Randy. At the time of the trial, the court responsible said the sentences were relatively short in response to the special circumstances of the island. Ever since, the island has been attempting to rehabilitate its image in an effort to encourage the immigration it needs to maintain its population. 
 
 At their trial, the arrested men insisted sexual activity between grown men and young girls was a long-standing feature of life on the island, based on cultural traditions stemming from the Polynesians who had been some of the island's original settlers. A study of island records and anecdotal evidence found that most of the women on the island had their first child between the ages of 12 and 15. 
 
 In 2005, six other men who had left the island were found guilty of sex crimes against children after being tried in New Zealand. 
 
 Pitcairn was settled in 1790 by nine mutineers from the British naval ship HMS Bounty, who arrived on the island with a group of 18 Tahitians, including six men, 11 women, and a baby girl. The Pitcairn Islands chain — which includes the three other uninhabited islands of Henderson, Ducie, and Oeno, — became a British colony in 1838. 
 
 Related: Northern Irish Child Abuse Survivors Want Alleged MI5 Collusion Properly Investigated 
 
 Image via Flickr
– Efforts to rehabilitate the image of a tiny British territory in the South Pacific that was rocked by a 2004 sex abuse scandal have hit a roadblock. The former mayor of Pitcairn Island has been convicted of possessing more than 1,000 images and videos showing the sexual abuse of children, reports Vice, which notes that Michael Warren is the eighth man of the island's male population of about 12 to be accused of sex crimes against children. The island's total population is about 50. Prosecutors say Warren, mayor between 2008 and 2013, began downloading the images more than a decade ago, the Guardian reports. Warren's possession of the images was first discovered when he mistakenly sent an email to a diplomatic staff member from an email address linked to a chat site containing explicit images. Warren downloaded the images during a period in which he was working in child protection on the island. Initially, he defended himself by saying he did so to understand child pornography after the 2004 scandal, in which seven of the island's men were accused of 55 sex crimes. Defendants in that trial argued that sex between men and young girls was a cultural tradition on Pitcairn. Those men received sentences ranging from community service to six years in prison, while Warren was sentenced to 20 months. It is unclear if he will serve the sentence in New Zealand, where the island's legal proceedings are conducted, or as the sole inmate of Pitcairn's prison, which was constructed by islanders convicted of sex crimes. The island desperately needs new immigrants to survive, and Warren's case surely won't help. (In the US, some former vets are now going after child predators.)