I don't find the story hard to believe at all. There have been several prominent cases very closely resembling this story reported in the US, so I'm not surprised that these things can happen in the culturally similar UK. Some of the stories also involved repair technicians working on a laptop; some involved workers at photo shops, back when people still took their film in for development. Some of the people being prosecuted had taken pictures of clothed children in public, but the police judged that the photographs were dirty. I realize this comment would be more useful with links, but I don't have the time right now.