A MILITANT atheist was found guilty of leaving grossly offensive religious images in a prayer room at Liverpool's John Lennon airport.

Jurors took just 15 minutes to convict Harry Taylor, 59, of leaving obscene material depicting figures from Christianity and Islam, often in sexual poses, in the multi-faith room with the intention of causing ha****ment and alarm.

Taylor, who labelled himself a militant atheist admitted placing the items in the prayer room on three separate occasions, but insisted he was simply practising his own religion of reason and rationality.

Taylor told jurors he had left the items in the room in memory of his hero John Lennon before reciting the words from the song Imagine.

He said: The airport is named after one of my heroes and his view on religion was pretty much the same as mine. I thought it was an insult to his memory to have a prayer room in his airport.

Giving evidence in his own defence, Taylor admitted being strongly anti-religious after being treated badly by the Catholic brothers as a boy growing up in Dublin.

But he insisted people would only be offended if their faith was weak and that the images were meant as satire.

But the jury of 10 women and two men, who all swore their oath on the Bible, rejected his defence.