We currently have a federal parolee on our city’s sex offender list who exemplifies the term online child exploitation across state lines. On October 24, 2000, Fritz, a 36-year-old man, was convicted in a United States District Court after he met up with a young girl who was under the age of 13 while he was living in Alabama. The child resided in Georgia. The child was enticed online and then brought across state lines from Georgia to Alabama for the purpose of sexual activity. The perpetrator further victimized the young girl by forever memorializing his sexual deviance with her on video. He was arrested for enticement and manufacturing child pornography. Upon his release from a federal penitentiary in New Jersey, Fritz chose to make New England his home. Because he is currently on a short leash in regard to our sex offender registry and his federal probation, we will forego mentioning Fritz’s last name.

The important point is that many people out there get convicted of crimes of this nature and often serve relatively minor sentences. Although our perpetrator spent more than 6 years in a federal prison, which is often much more than a state sentence will bring, he was released into society while still in his 40s. You can either look at this as young enough to start over and learn from the error of his deviance, or young enough to victimize again. Another point to remember is that we can only be certain of the victimization for which he was convicted. How many other victims might there have been before he was caught? How many are out there who have committed similar egregious crimes but have not yet been caught?

They say that reality is stranger than fiction, but we have a habit of saying, “You just can’t make this stuff up”. We’ve dealt with several cases in which the child porn suspect has such deviant behavior that it results in a jaw-dropping reaction from the investigating officers.

As an example of how disturbing an individual’s penchant for collecting child pornography can be, how about the suspect who had such a huge collection, the computer server storing the images was too big for transport in the back of a police cruiser. In order to get the server to the location where the evidence was to be stored and examined, a local ambulance was called for transport. Probably one of the oddest “medical” calls that ambulance crew had ever responded to.

The preceding actual case anecdotes are truly a part of what law enforcement categorizes as the jaw dropping, “you can’t make this stuff up” behavior we see everyday on these investigations. Reality some times is stranger than fiction.

In July of 2006, on the 25th anniversary of the abduction of Adam Walsh from a Florida mall, the Adam Walsh Act was passed in the United States. Adam Walsh was the young son of John Walsh, the host of America’s Most Wanted. Adam was murdered, and the perpetrator was never definitively identified. The Adam Walsh Act has restructured the responsibilities of the 50 states in how they handle sex offender registration.

Sex offender registration still varies from state to state, although states are becoming more consistent with one another and working more closely together to ensure sex offender compliance. At the beginning of 2007, it was estimated that 128,000 of the 565,000 registered sex offenders were noncompliant in the United States. This translates into over a 20% noncompliance rate. For the public, this means that many offenders are unaccounted for and could be living anywhere.

Sex offender registries have become a hot topic for many communities, and as usual there are those who are trying to make money from them, including websites such as the National Alert Registry (http://www.nationalalertregistry.com/), which charges a “one-time setup fee” of $10 for a report and child safety kit and $5 a month for updates. A plethora of sites allow you to enter your address or ZIP Code and will give you the registered sex offenders residing in your neighborhood. Some are free; some (such as the National Alert Registry) charge for their services. Such sites allow a visitor to pinpoint every sex offender within an entire community.

We have to wonder why a site would charge a monthly fee if its true intent is to safeguard communities, especially for information that is already in the public domain (see the section “The National Sex Offender Public Registry” later in this chapter).

Some sites are free and can be located simply by typing “sex offender registry” in Google. Free or not, these sites are not necessarily accurate. They are not regularly updated, particularly if an offender moves out of a community. These sites are also missing the many offenders that are classified as nonpublic or public by request only—often classified as Level/Tier I and II. Only law enforcement can obtain nonpublic information, and only law enforcement has access to the most current sex offender lists. So much for those websites.

For law enforcement, these sites are a double-edged sword. Although the public has become better informed of the predators who might be living in their neighborhoods, the intent of the sex offender registry was for law enforcement to keep track of sex offenders who had served their sentences and had been released back into society. Part of the premise was that a registry might be a safeguard in helping to prevent recidivism if the offenders know they are being tracked and watched.

The problem has been the overzealous community members who have taken the information from the websites and have plastered posters in neighborhoods, have accosted convicted sex offenders, and have raised all holy hell with city councils, school departments, and police departments about offenders living in their neighborhoods and near schools. Just recently we had to handle a situation where a number of parents felt the need to hand out fliers of a registered sex offender living near a local elementary school to parents as they dropped their children off at school one morning. The panic that ensued was irrational. Kristyn received a call from a grandmother who asked her to speak with her 10-year-old grandchild because the child had seen the flier and panicked. The little girl told Kristyn that she was “freaked out” that she and her friends might be raped by the sex offender near their playground. No 10-year-old should be put in a position where she is worried about becoming a rape victim. This is an example of how reason and good judgment must be used by parents in teaching their children about safety and awareness. The fact that these children were subjected to this information in this manner is, in our opinion, irresponsible. Safety is a topic that school departments and police departments address with students every day, with a set curriculum that teaches the fundamentals without causing stress and panic. A parent’s fear that something bad may happen to a child is certainly real; however, it is important to address these fears with reason and information.

Knowledge is power. However, we have to put this in perspective. First of all, many states have registries where offenders are categorized as public or nonpublic. These classifications are often made dependent upon the nature of the criminal conviction or whether the victim is a child. Any conviction where a child is victimized or the crime involves child exploitation is generally a public view category. Nonpublic offenders are those with misdemeanor convictions or felony-level convictions where the victim is an adult. These classifications are still changing across the country. Some states even have offenders who are only required to be on the registry lists for a set number of years because the severity of their crime is of a lesser degree. Only the public offenders will find their way to a website, assuming that the website is even accurate. Of the sites we have visited, none of the private ones were even accurate, many listing more offenders than were actually living in a community. These sites must be maintained with accurate, up-to-date information, and it is often questionable where the sites obtained the information to begin with. We recommend that concerned citizens visit the sex offender registry sites that are sponsored by the state sex offender registration offices. In most states, the sex offender registry is often maintained by the State Police or Department of Safety of that state. Only there will you be able to access the most up-to-date information on offenders in your area.

We cannot emphasize enough how important it is to keep this information in perspective. First, only public offenders are listed on the sites. Lists of nonpublic offenders aren’t accessible to the public.

Second, in order to be required to register as a sex offender, an individual has to have been convicted of a qualifying sexual offense. Only after the conviction and the completion of the court-ordered sentence will an individual appear on a registry. One must keep in mind that many offenders will never make it onto the sex offender registry for a number of reasons: First, the sex offense must be reported; then the case must be investigated and charges must be filed. Ultimately, a conviction must be handed down through a plea, a judge’s ruling, or a jury finding the defendant guilty in order for a predator to become a registered sex offender.

Many cases of sexual abuse are never reported. Of those that are reported, many never make it to a court room due to lack of evidence or the inability of a victim to handle the emotional stress of a trial. Oftentimes, an individual charged with a sex offense will plead out to a lesser offense that may not be a qualifying sex offense. Pleas are a way to ensure that the wheels of justice continue to turn. A plea bargain will ensure that an offender is punished and that the system does not get bogged down with too many trials.

The problem with a plea in a sex offense case is that a truly violent sexual predator might never have to register as a sex offender as a result of the plea. For example, we have a predator in our community who has been investigated for molesting at least two children. He was initially charged with aggravated felonious sexual assault in New Hampshire, which was for the rape of a minor. The case was pled down to second-degree assault, a charge that is usually associated with someone being severely beaten up and sustaining a serious injury that might require long-term recovery, such as a broken limb. A conviction of second-degree assault does not require the perpetrator to register as a sex offender, even if the underlying case was a sexually based crime. Although state legislatures are addressing this type of issue, it is still a problem. In many cases, the way to encourage an offender and his or her defense attorney to take a plea is to sweeten the deal by not requiring the offender to register.

Another recent example involved a case where the offender was charged with aggravated felonious sexual assault and felonious sexual assault, involving a 15-year-old. Convictions of these charges would place the offender on the public view list. However, the plea agreement allowed the offender to take a conviction for a misdemeanor sexual assault, which, in New Hampshire, only requires the offender to register as a nonpublic offender for 10 years.

Whereas kidnapping in many states would require an offender to register, homicide might not, even if there was a sexual component to the case, depending on how the crime was charged and the plea agreement. We hate to say it, but there are individuals in our communities who are not registered offenders but whose history make them more dangerous than some of the offenders listed in the registry. And because these predators have not been convicted, the public cannot be warned in any way of their perversions.

Bookmark the website for the National Sex Offender Public Registry: www.nsopr.gov. Many local police departments have links to statewide versions of this registry. You need to visit it and get familiar with the names and pictures (many are posted) of those on the public registry in your area.

Again, remember that there are many sex offenders whose names are not required by law to be released publicly, and they pose a danger to your children, as well. Do not fall into complacency because there are no publicly registered sex offenders living in your neighborhood. We have seen a website that supposedly maps the locations of sex offenders, but its contents were not up to date. This concerns us because it can create a false sense of security. Our experience tells us that you need to be as worried about the person your child is talking to online (even if he or she claims to be another 13-year old) as you do the pedophile who is registered and living down the road.

Table 8.1 traces the development of child pornography laws in the United States. As you can see in this table, in 2002 the U.S. Supreme Court issued a historical and rather disturbing ruling when it announced that computer-generated images of child pornography are perfectly legal as long as no actual child is used in the production of the image.

Table 8.1 Development of Child Pornography Laws in the United States^[*]

If you don’t know anything about computer-generated images, look at Figure 8.3 to see if you can tell if it is real or computer-generated.

The answer? The photo is computer-generated.

Computer graphics technology has come a long way because of high-end graphic imaging and manipulation programs such as PhotoShop. Although these programs have led to amazing advances in many fields, including medical science, art, and business, they have also led to the creation of “virtual” child pornography, which is excluded under the law. Millions of dollars are spent every year by law enforcement in an attempt to determine what is real and what is computer-generated.

The 2002 Supreme Court ruling struck down an earlier ruling from 1996 that banned all material that “appeared to be” a child in a sexually explicit situation. The new ruling excluded child pornography that was computer-generated, although the process of “morphing” (pasting a real child’s face onto a naked body) remains illegal.

In reaction, Congress passed a law in 2003 making it a crime to exchange online messages about “any material or purported material” that would cause “another to believe” it depicted a minor engaged in sex, whether “actual or simulated”. Violations of this law call for at least 5 years and as many as 20 years in prison, but the law has been repeatedly challenged as being “too broad” and could ensnare a grandmother who sends an email with the subject “Good pics of kids in bed” depicting her sleeping grandchildren.

The original 2002 ruling has placed a huge burden on prosecutors, who now have to prove at a great expense, that an image is, in fact, real.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

The cornerstone for those of us in law enforcement who work cases involving child exploitation is, without question, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). From 1984 through the present, NCMEC has been involved with more than 133,000 missing children cases. NCMEC has assisted in reuniting more than 115,700 children with their loved ones. Every day in the U.S., 2,200 children are reported missing, an annual total of 1.3 million runaways. Five thousand of these children die every year due to homicide, disease, and suicide, a number NCMEC works tirelessly to reduce every day. NCMEC’s reported recovery rate in 2007 was 96%, up from 62% in 1990, with an estimated one in six children having been recovered as a result of a photograph. Also, since 1984, the NCMEC hotline (1-800-THE-LOST) has received 2.2 million calls, an average of 283 calls each day.

NCMEC’s cyber tipline has received more than 524,876 reports since 1998, with more than 29,729 reports of online enticement. Because of the SAFE Act, which established guidelines for the reporting and preservation of information, 325 electronic service providers are legally obligated to report exploitation of children online. NCMEC is currently averaging 2,000 cases per week, 1,500 of which are illegal activity. In 2007, NCMEC handled more than 105,000 cases.

Relationship of Abuser to Child

•  Neighbor/friend: 27%

•  Other relative: 10%

•  Parent/step parent: 35%

•  Online enticement encouraging image on webcam or photo: 10%

•  Babysitter/coach: 4%

•  Guardian’s partner (girlfriend/boyfriend): 4%

•  Self-produced (that is, using one’s own camera phone): 5%

•  Relationship unknown to child: 5%

It is common for children not to disclose victimization regarding child pornography, and given that victims in child sexual abuse images are statistically more exploited by people they love and trust, it is no wonder.

NCMEC is also a leader in educating professionals working to stop child victimization. To date, NCMEC has trained more than 227,700 law enforcement, criminal justice, and healthcare professionals in the U.S. and Canada. They have distributed more than 15,000 law-enforcement guides.

CVIP costs about $1 million a year to run, with this program having reviewed millions of images to authenticate that they are indeed real as a result of Ashcroft v. Free Speech. Absent an assessment by the Center, pediatricians and other experts can be called in to testify to physical characteristics of children at different ages to try to authenticate a photo. Sometimes computer graphic experts are called in.

Some recent rulings allow jurors to decide whether an image is fake. Bear in mind that although this type of ruling places a burden on prosecutors, our experience is that pedophiles are likely to have much more than just one or two images on their computer. Even if a few proved to be computer-generated, there’s more than likely many more that are not.

Despite that, our right to free speech forces law enforcement to jump through this victim identification hoop in order to prosecute child pornographers and child pornography collectors. NCMEC and CVIP have really placed the focus on the identification of the victim for the safety of children, not solely for the prosecution of perpetrators. Saving children from victimization, regardless of the court outcome, is what we truly work for—and NCMEC has set the standard.

In 1999, 30 Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) task forces throughout the U.S. were partnered with U.S. postal inspectors in a proactive, 2-year undercover operation that took down what was then the largest child pornography enterprise ever known. Landslide Productions, Inc., was a multimillion-dollar child pornography business that was discovered to be selling child pornography websites to customers worldwide. Monthly fees allowed subscribers access to hundreds of websites containing very graphic child pornography.

During the course of the investigation, NCMEC received in excess of 270 complaints from all over the world in reference to this case.

Subscribers to Landslide paid $29.95 each to access the child porn websites. It had a list of 300,000 customers in 37 states and 60 countries. Landslide Productions, Inc., which was owned and operated by Thomas and Janice Reedy of Fort Worth, Texas, grossed over $1.4 million in 1 month. For 2 years, Landslide Productions took in almost $10 million.

The Reedys were convicted of 89 counts of conspiracy to distribute child pornography and possession of child pornography. Thomas Reedy was sentenced to life in federal prison, while Janice Reedy received a 14-year sentence.

In the course of this investigation, over 160 state and federal search warrants were executed, and more than 120 arrests were made for trafficking child pornography through the U.S. mail and the Internet. This operation identified predators and victims. One of the arrests stemming from this investigation was that of a 36-year-old computer consultant from North Carolina who had rigged a pinhole camera in a smoke detector to record the molestation of several children, one of whom was only 4 years old. That case resulted in a 17 1/2–year prison sentence.

Operation Avalanche crossed boundaries and borders, joining state, local, and federal law-enforcement agencies on a mission that impacted 60 countries and brought many pornographers and molesters to justice. This cooperative effort continues today through Project Safe Child, where local, state, and federal partners are working with ICAC task forces from state to state to combat the exploitation of our most innocent victims.

In June of 2006, Marshall Zidel was sentenced to 1 to 7 years in prison following an April conviction on child pornography charges in Hillsboro Superior Court in New Hampshire. He had been convicted on eight other counts, which included a 1-year suspended sentence.

Zidel had been a photographer at a children’s camp in Amherst, New Hampshire, and he digitally combined the faces of girl campers with obscene photos of adult women. There were nine “morphed” digital photos in which Zidel used the faces of 14- and 15-year-old girls who attended the camp. Zidel had been an employee of the camp for more than 20 years. Several of the pictures were labeled with lewd captions, which contained some of the names of the campers, similar to the aforementioned case of David Cobb (a.k.a. The Pumpkin Man).

Zidel’s attorney argued that these were never intended for distribution but were rather for his client’s own “private fantasy”. The nine images were discovered when Zidel inadvertently left them on a CD of photos that were to be used for a camp yearbook.

Zidel and his attorney appealed the conviction, arguing that these images were not what legislators intended to be outlawed as child pornography. The argument was that digitally manipulated images that do not involve naked children, and would not appear to involve naked children to a reasonable person, are not child pornography. This was yet another complication in the definition of child pornography as a result of computer software that can manipulate an image to appear lewd or obscene without an actual child sexual assault photo of real victims having been taken.

The New Hampshire Supreme Court overturned the conviction in January of 2008, with Associate Justice James Duggan writing the following:

However distasteful, reprehensible, and valueless this conduct might seem, the First Amendment protects “the individual’s right to… observe what he pleases…. This protection is central to our long and sacred tradition of prohibiting the government from intruding into the privacy of our thoughts and the contents of our homes.

Essentially, the case was overturned because Zidel never intended to distribute the morphed images. The First Amendment goes a long way toward protecting everyone’s freedom, but it does not protect someone’s right to create or distribute child pornography. How can one say that the children whose faces were placed on obscene pictures were not harmed? How can one say definitively that Zidel was not satisfying the deviant urge of a pedophile? Who is to say that this wasn’t a precipitating behavior to live child exploitation? And does it matter that Zidel never intended for the morphed images to be made public, because they did become very public. This case emphasizes the notion that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”. We can’t think of any reason why the manipulation of a child’s photograph in this manner should not be illegal—we can only hope that legislators wake up and label this what it really is: deviant and wrong.

In May of 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a federal law prohibiting the possession of child pornography as part of the PROTECT Act (Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to End the Exploitation of Children Today Act). It sets a mandatory 5-year prison term for promoting or pandering, even if someone doesn’t actually have child pornography in his possession. In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that “offers to provide or requests to obtain child pornography are categorically excluded from the First Amendment”.

This means that someone still has to have the intent of committing the crime of promoting or pandering child pornography. The case reinstated the conviction of a Florida man, Michael Williams, who was convicted of “pandering” child pornography when he was caught up in an undercover operation in April of 2004. Williams had offered to trade nude photos of his toddler to an undercover agent, but when his computer was seized, he did not actually have any photos of his toddler, though he did have 22 other sexually explicit photos of other children on his computer. The case was centered around the charge of pandering, which is defined as “promoting or distributing real or purported material that would reflect the belief that there actually is child pornography”.

Williams pleaded guilty to possessing the child pornography and was sentenced to 5 years in prison, but lawyers challenged the pandering charge, claiming that the wording was “overly broad” and violated the First Amendment right to free speech.

The case was heard in a federal appeals court and overturned. One of the arguments made, which the federal appeals court agreed with, was that offering a video of Snow White could be considered illegal if the person making the offer claimed that the video depicted minors engaged in sex.

We couldn’t agree more. Excluding the fact of whether or not an actual child is used, “virtual” child pornography is still dangerous because it feeds deviant compulsions. In addition, it places a huge burden on prosecutors to try and prove that the child porn is, in fact, real, not virtual. Digital imaging experts need to be called in along with a host of other “experts” to testify at a great expense. Children are still at risk, virtual or not.

Child pornography laws are still being changed and loopholes being closed in many states. As we write this, the state of New Hampshire is in the midst of debating changes to current legislation regarding child pornography or “child sexual assault images” and what age can be considered a victim. One of the issues is that the Adam Walsh Act has made the possession of child pornography illegal if the child is under the age of 18. Many of us have lobbied and testified for our state to change the age from 16 to 18. Unfortunately, some legislators feel that a 16-year-old can make the decision to star in their own sexually explicit video. Others feel it would be too hard to tell if a child was 16, 17, or 19 in order to prosecute.

As a parent, how would you feel if someone videotaped your 16-year-old daughter having sex or simply in a state of undress? How would you feel if the videographer was a 43-year-old male? Should that be illegal?

What if a 16-year-old child is being sexually abused and videotaped by a perpetrator—maybe a family member? Shouldn’t that be illegal because it occurred during a sexual assault?

What might seem like a fun idea on prom night could end up haunting that naive 16-year-old child. We are aware of a case involving a boyfriend who paid for the prom, limo, and hotel for his girlfriend. They willingly videotaped their sexual escapades that night. They both graduated and went off to separate colleges. The boy paid for a trip to see his girlfriend at her college, only to be dumped. He spent the night on the street. As payback, the creative, jilted lover made his own “Priceless” ad, similar to the well-recognized series of MasterCard advertisements, and posted it and the video of their sexual activity online. Now that the video is posted, it will haunt the woman forever, because it can never be removed from cyberspace. The evidence of an immature decision at 16 years old can legally be posted without that person’s permission. In states where child sexual assault images are illegal under the age of 18, this case could be criminally pursued. In states where the laws have not caught up to the federal age of 18, this case cannot be pursued other than in civil court.

Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) investigators can charge a suspect for possession of child pornography only for videos or images where the victim has been positively identified or the age of the victim is readily apparent (infant, toddler, prepubescent child). Therefore, a suspect would only be charged for possession of a video or image of a 16- or 17-year-old if the child had been positively identified.

Customs Agents do not need any evidence of wrongdoing to search the contents of your laptop if you are at an international border. You may have heard the term probable cause, which refers to specific evidence or the standard of reasonable suspicion that a police officer must have in order to arrest someone or to conduct a personal or property search. However, the courts have ruled that at an airport, a laptop is no different from a suitcase, a car, or any other piece of property and can be searched without “probable cause”.

This ruling came as a result of a case from July of 2005 when a 44-year-old math teacher from Orange County, California, returning from a flight from the Philippines, was subjected to a search that included his laptop. The man was asked by a Customs Agent to turn on his computer, and images of what appeared to child pornography were found. The defendant’s attorney will appeal the ruling.

Just recently, Democratic senators Russell Feingold (Wisconsin) and Patrick Leahy (Vermont) issued a challenge to the scope and authority of U.S. Customs and Border Agents. They have asked for a review of policy that allows U.S. Customs to assume they have the right to inspect a laptop. Senator Feingold was quoted as saying, “If you asked [U.S. residents] whether the government has a right to open their laptops, read their documents and e-mails, look at their photographs, and examine the websites they have visited, all without any suspicion of wrongdoing, I think those same Americans would say the government has no right to do that.” (“Senators Question Border Laptop Searches,” PC World, June 25, 2008.)

Although we understand the concerns over the rights to privacy, were it not for the search of a Texan man’s laptop, Canadian border officials might not have found the child pornography of a known sexual offender. When 45-year-old Kevin D. Moore of Texas was asked if he had any illegal documents on his laptop as he arrived at an Ottawa airport, he replied that he didn’t; however, he reported that his brother also used his laptop, as a means to divert suspicion from his own activities. Moore had already been sentenced in 2003 for sexually assaulting a child. He will now spend 30 more years in prison and be on supervised release once he gets out.

The right to privacy is sometimes difficult to balance with the rights of the public to be safe and for the law to be enforced. In law enforcement, we hear that infamous term “Big Brother” all the time. Felicia recently commented on a blog regarding the difficulties law enforcement faces regarding sharing police information and was immediately flamed by privacy advocates (replying as “Anonymous,” of course), who challenged law enforcement’s right to share information and who drew all kinds of correlations to a communist state.

There is always a balance to be found here, but laws are made to protect people, and we do advocate for any law that will further protect our children. We’d be jumping for joy if law enforcement never had to draw up another search warrant, forensically examine another computer, or tap another phone; however, the reality is that our children are still at tremendous risk—more so now than ever before—due to the proliferation of technology.

People’s perspectives change when they realize the lengths that law enforcement will go to protect a child from getting hurt. People’s perspectives also change when they, themselves, become victims of crime. We’ll respect and defend your rights, but let’s put the rights of those that cannot protect themselves first.

The point we need to emphasize is that there is no magic “profile” for a sexual offender. Trust us, they come in all shapes and sizes, sexes, and orientations. If it were as simple as finding the sketchiest-looking guy and hauling him off, knowing our children are safe, we’d be thrilled. However, that’s not reality. As such, law enforcement operates on information, and often that information is contained on computers that require searching.

On December 5, 2007, the SAFE (Securing Adolescents From Exploitation Online) Act was introduced and passed by a House vote of 409 to 2. At the time of this writing, the bill has yet to be voted on by the Senate, but has already caused some controversy because of the changes it brings.

Laws already exist that require any Internet service provider (ISP), such as Comcast or AOL, to report the presence of child pornography to NCMEC (the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children) through a cyber tipline if they become aware of it.

The SAFE Act, in essence, creates stiffer penalties and broadens the definition of “Internet service provider” to include wireless (Wi-Fi) hot spots such as hotels, libraries, and municipalities. This does not mean that your local cyber café will be monitoring your activities or searching your hard drive for illicit images. It does, however, mean that the penalties against ISPs who do not report the presence of kiddie porn just tripled—from $50,000 per day per image for the first offense to $150,000, and up to $300,000 per day for repeat offenders.

It is well known that social networks have become the playground of predators. How better to fuel a predator’s deviance than to offer hundreds of thousands of children ready to be solicited, groomed, and potentially molested?

On February 2, 2007, MySpace.com announced they had partnered with Sentinel Tech in donating a Sentinel Safe database to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). The database, jointly developed by MySpace and Sentinel, enables websites to identify convicted sex offenders and then remove and block them from online communities.

On January 15, 2008, MySpace announced several initiatives to lock out sexual predators, including “date of birth” validation. This came 3 months after Facebook took similar initiatives. Although we applaud any efforts to try and restrict pedophiles’ access to children, the painful reality is that many of these policies are too easily thwarted.

We recently had a case in which a public sex offender against children had a MySpace page using his real name, date of birth, and biographical data. If notified about the offender, MySpace would shut down the page. However, just as kids make up data to set up a page, so can an offender. It is all too easy. We are able to maintain juvenile accounts on many venues for undercover and investigative work despite all the new policies. If we can maintain them, surely others can and will—including predators. The bottom line is, and always will be, this: There is no substitute for parental oversight when kids go online. Be aware!

Our local high school was very public about blocking student access to sites such as MySpace; however, students were able to get around the firewall in a matter of minutes. When Kristyn was the high school resource officer, she had a student who utilized her Internet time during geography class purporting to be a 26-year-old exotic dancer using the online name “Raging Redhead”.

This young woman chatted with several older men from other New England states and made plans to “hook up”. The young woman’s geography teacher conceded that she had assigned a project to her students, but had trusted them to handle the online assignment maturely. Luckily, “Raging Redhead” had a mother who had also been monitoring her daughter’s online activity, and we were able to confront the young woman and keep an eye on her risky tendencies.

In December of 2007, the Senate unanimously passed the Keeping the Internet Devoid of Sexual Predators (KIDS) Act. It requires sex offenders to register and submit their email addresses and online screen names to the National Sex Offender Registry. The bill has received support from social networking venues such as MySpace and Facebook. Although we support any effort to try to legislate and curtail the activities of sexual offenders, our experience tells us that this will not stop someone who has a compulsive need to harm a child. He will simply assume a new persona. Without the legal authority to monitor whatever computers a sex offender uses, we would not assume that this is a valid deterrent.

As we write this, several major Internet service providers (ISPs), including Verizon Communications, Sprint Nextel, and Time Warner Cable, have agreed to block Internet newsgroups and websites that contain and disseminate child pornography. The three also agreed to donate more than a million dollars to combat child pornography. Together, they represent millions of customers.

It is expected that tens of thousands of Usenet discussion groups will be shut down. These actions come as a result of an agreement with New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo after many websites and Usenet groups (online groups with specific areas of interest) were found to contain child pornography. Reports indicate that the agreements follow an 8-month investigation in which undercover agents from Attorney General Cuomo’s office, who posed as subscribers, complained to the ISPs about the child porn and little was done despite user agreements that prohibit the transmission or dissemination of sexually exploitive images of children. The Internet service providers were compelled to act or face charges of fraud and deceptive business practices. Cuomo was reported as saying, “The ISPs’ point has been, ‘We’re not responsible, these are individuals communicating with individuals. We’re not responsible.’ Our point was that at some point, you do bear responsibility”.

NCMEC, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, will maintain the “blacklist” of sites and newsgroups to be shut down. Authorities have the tools to identify 11,000 known images of child pornography because these same photos are often traded over and over again. Images can be identified by what is known as the “hash value” or a digital identifier. Once an image is identified and catalogued, its hash value can be scanned and searched for in other places.

The three companies agreed to take down child porn websites as NCMEC identifies them or after complaints and investigations. Shortly after this story broke, the Internet filled with comments on blogs and news sites—both for and against the action. As always happens whenever organizations move to block content on the Internet, an outcry is heard from those who feel this is an infringement on First Amendment rights and that “Big Brother” is wielding its mighty sword. Others are concerned about their own groups being shut down because they are mistakenly blacklisted.

We have both worked child pornography cases. We have seen the horrific images and what lengths pedophiles will go to satisfy their sexual deviance. As parents, we are far more concerned about the rights of the victimized children and their safety than the rights of those who may be crossing the line with sexually explicit photographs.

On a side note, at the same time the U.S. companies entered into this agreement, France’s Interior Minister announced that beginning in September 2008, users would be given a way to flag sites that carry child pornography. This information would be used to develop similar “blacklists,” which would be forwarded to French Internet service providers who have agreed to block the sites. The French minister also said that France would pass on information about any illegal sites to the host countries. Other states in the U.S., including California, are following suit with asking for voluntary compliance by ISPs. As of the time of this writing, AT&T and Time Warner’s America Online (AOL) unit have also agreed to shut down known sites trading child pornography. AT&T is the largest ISP in New York, with approximately 18.3 million subscribers. AOL is second with 9.3 million subscribers.

We are watching these stories closely as they unfold because 1) they represent a major shift in most Internet service providers’ attitudes about not interfering with content, and 2) they can make a significant dent in the child porn trafficking industry because of the sheer number of subscribers affected.

The ICAC task force, composed of law-enforcement officers across the country, is funded by the Department of Justice through the Project Safe Childhood initiative. It recently (October of 2007) got a $3 million boost in funding to create an ICAC presence in all 50 states. ICAC has made over 10,000 arrests since its inception 9 years ago.

We think often about the young victims of predators such as Huskey and all the children who have crossed our paths as victims of sexual assault. To that end, we’d like to explain what does happen to these young victims.

When a child victim of sexual abuse or exploitation has been disclosed or has been identified, the investigation process is a far cry from that of a computer forensic investigation. The focus shifts from objective, stark data, to a more human approach into behavior. Law enforcement has come a long way in handling the youngest victims of crime—we are compassionate, empathic, patient, and determined to put the needs of the victim well before the need for a conviction or a statistic.

The Child Advocacy Center model was created from the vision of Robert E. “Bud” Cramer, then a District Attorney in Alabama and now a Congressman, who in 1985 organized an effort to better serve abused children. His notion was to minimize a child victim’s emotional distress and lack of trust in adults, while maximizing interagency cooperation in the effort to investigate these egregious crimes as well as to provide prevention, education, and services. The team approach includes professionals from law enforcement, medical, mental health, and child protective services. This multidisciplinary approach focuses on the well being of the child and still affords investigators the best opportunity to prosecute predators.

In the best-case scenario, the child victim should only be subjected to one in-depth interview, which reduces the revictimization of the child and provides law enforcement with the most comprehensive, consistent information with which to proceed with the investigation. Whereas large agencies have specialized investigators and specialized units of trained personnel, most smaller agencies (which in reality are often the norm) usually do not. On top of this, we often deal with very young victims or victims with cognitive or emotional disabilities. The case still requires a solid forensic interview using a specially trained interviewer.

As law enforcement is focusing on criminal charges, child protection agencies often run parallel investigations focusing on child protection through a civil (nonpunitive) process. Multiple interviews with the same victim, conducted by different people from the various agencies involved, can lead to inconsistencies in the victim’s statements, as well as forcing the victim to relive the trauma of abuse each time the story has to be told again.

The Child Advocacy (CAC) model involves a multidisciplinary approach in a neutral setting. A trained forensic interviewer, not associated with any investigative agency, meets with the child in an offsite setting away from any police department or child protection office. The room is pleasantly decorated and child friendly. The interviewer and the child sit at a table and get acquainted with basic conversation. The interview is audio and video recorded, being streamed in real time into a room where law-enforcement officers, social workers, and prosecutors can monitor the proceedings. Special headsets allow the “team” to direct questions that arise from the interview to the interviewer through an ear piece. The child only speaks with one person during this interview process. The child decides the direction of the “conversation,” and the interviewer follows the child’s lead in gathering pertinent information. The child is told that the interview is being monitored and recorded, and that he or she can decide to stop if the conversation becomes uncomfortable. No child is forced to speak with an interviewer. The resulting interview can be used for both law enforcement and child protection investigations.

The family is briefed as to the process prior to the interview and meets all team members, including the forensic interviewer, affording them the opportunity to ask questions or express concerns. An advocate from a sexual assault support agency is present to offer support and comfort for the family and victim during the process. The family does not witness the interview, but rather waits with an advocate in another room. Following the interview, parents are given resources and information as to the next steps in the case investigation.

The video recordings are entered into evidence, used only for the prosecution of the case. Video recordings allow investigators and prosecutors to review the interview in the victim’s own words and minimizes the need to re-interview at a later time.

Child protective services, social services, child advocates, mental health intervention, and medical services can be brought into the process as deemed appropriate for the victim and family, regardless of whether the case ever sees a courtroom. Child Advocacy Centers are set up regionally across the country, accessible by any law-enforcement or child protective agency in that region. They are also especially convenient when a case crosses jurisdictions, with more than one law-enforcement agency investigating multiple incidences of abuse of a victim, in that one interview is used by all investigating agencies involved in the case.

This model has been successful, not only for prosecution, but for making the investigative process as “victim oriented” as possible, keeping the needs of the child first and foremost. The child is the center, and the process will focus on the individual needs of that specific child throughout the investigative process. Whether or not a case is prosecuted depends completely on what is in the best interest of the child and his or her needs.

For more information on the history of Child Advocacy Centers and the prevention, training, intervention, and therapy the National Child Advocacy Center offers, visit www.nationalcac.org.

The Western Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force conducted a survey in March of 2008 for which they had been preparing for well over a year. Investigators searched for computers that were trading known images of child pornography, as identified by NCMEC (National Center for Missing and Exploited Children). They took a 30-day snapshot of files being shared through computers in Missouri. The results were unsettling. More than 7,000 computers using peer-to-peer (P2P) software like that used to trade music were found to have traded child pornography. Seven thousand computers in 30 days. How much more can be said about how pervasive and prolific a problem this is? Investigators are preparing search warrants and subpoenas.

Here are some basic steps you should take, at the very least, to protect your kids online:

•  Place the computer in a common area, not your child’s bedroom.

•  Talk with your kids about online dangers.

•  Limit time online.

•  Discuss the appropriate use of chat, instant messaging, email, and social networking sites.

•  Do not let kids post pictures of themselves on the Internet.

•  Use parental controls through Internet Explorer to block inappropriate sites.