Warning: This story contains graphic and distressing details of animal cruelty and references to child abuse.
While Adam Britton publicly marketed himself as a crocodile expert and wildlife specialist, working with David Attenborough and running a podcast, the zoologist was hiding behind anonymous online profiles, uploading pictures and videos of himself torturing and murdering dozens of animals.
He regularly invited TV cameras onto his property to show off his pet crocodile Smaug and he garnered international attention and respect for his research.
But hidden near his rural Darwin home was a shipping container he dubbed his own personal "torture room", where he murdered and sexually exploited dozens of dogs, including puppies.
He admitted to being interested in "zoo-sadism" and, in hundreds of online messages shown to the Northern Territory Supreme Court, Britton advised others on how to carry out the same abhorrent abuse.
The details of his crimes run more than 90 pages, in agreed facts and annexures tendered to the court.
But the contents of the documents are so horrific the ABC has chosen not to publish them.
In September last year, Chief Justice of the NT Supreme Court Michael Grant described Britton's heinous crimes as "grotesque cruelty", which was both "confronting and distressing".
In a rare move, he excused even security officers and sheriffs from the courtroom when the facts of Britton's case were read out.
"[The facts] in my assessment have the potential to cause nervous shock or some other adverse psychological reaction to a person exposed to those details," Chief Justice Grant said.
Case faces several delays
Britton pleaded guilty to around 60 charges last September, and both his lawyer and the prosecution were scheduled to make submissions to the court about what his sentence should be in December.
That hearing was delayed and re-scheduled to take place on Tuesday.
However, his lawyers have requested more time to examine a psychiatric report they received on Friday last week, and for prosecutors to seek their own psychiatric report in response.
Chief Justice Grant questioned how any psychiatric evidence could possibly reduce Britton's moral culpability for his actions.
"A serial killer can't say, for example, 'My moral culpability is reduced because I suffer from psychopathy'," Chief Justice Grant said.
"I just can't see where the evidence is going here."
Sentencing submissions are now scheduled for May.
Outside court, a small number of animal activists gathered, telling media they wanted to "give a voice to the voiceless" victims of Britton's crimes.
"He's got to be punished so people don't think that animals are something that can be exploited and abused," one protester said.
"We realise [the death penalty] isn't going to happen … but incarcerated forever would be my personal choice."
The graphic details
When Britton pleaded guilty last year, senior Crown prosecutor Marty Aust detailed Britton's torture, rape and murder of more than 40 animals.
He told the court the 52-year-old used websites such as Gumtree to source new dogs, promising their previous owners he would give them a "good home".
"[Britton] took photos of the dogs prior to torturing and killing them and would communicate false narratives to the dog owners and send pictures, explaining that the particular animals were settling in well," Mr Aust told the court.
"Unbeknownst to the previous owners the dogs had already been sexually exploited, tortured and killed by the offender."
In secret chat groups, Britton taught others how to copy his behaviour.
On one occasion he told another person:
"Most people want to know you're a good person and the dog is going to a good home, it'll have space to play, you'll take it for walks, it might live in the house etc. Telling them you want a new family member after your old dog died from cancer last year hardly ever fails."
In other messages Britton wrote:
"I was talking with someone else about why I love to hurt dogs … I wasn't sure at first, but now I live for it. I can't stop myself hurting dogs."
"I was sadistic as a child to animals, but I had repressed it. In the last few years I let it out again, and now I can't stop. I don't want to. :)"
How he was caught
Britton routinely filmed himself torturing and sexually exploiting the animals, uploading the footage to the internet.
While the videos did not usually identify him or his location, a bright City of Darwin dog leash in the background of one of the clips triggered the unravelling of his secret double life.
An anonymous tip-off to authorities sparked Operation Haine — an investigation by the NT Police and Australian Federal Police's Joint Anti-Child Exploitation Team – which resulted in a search warrant of Britton's McMinns Lagoon home on Darwin's outskirts.
Britton was arrested on April 22, 2022, and has been on remand in jail since.
He will return to court on May 3.
For each of the eight counts of bestiality, Britton faces three years in prison.
Possessing and transmitting child abuse material – of which Britton has pleaded guilty to four counts – carries a maximum penalty of 10 years for each charge.
For each of the 37 counts of aggravated animal cruelty, Britton faces a maximum of five years in jail.