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The views and opinions in this article may be disturbing to some readers. Explicit content and/or information might be given. Parents are warned that the content might not be appropriate for young readers.

Record year for solving federal child sex exploitation cases

By PAULA BARR
Daily Journal Staff Writer

The year 2007 was a record year for solving cases dealing with federal child sex exploitation cases by the  U.S. Attorney’s Eastern District of Missouri office in St. Louis.

During 2007, the office prosecuted 51 men and one woman from eastern Missouri for child sex exploitation crimes, including defendants from Desloge, Ironton and Potosi. That number was up from 34 indictments in 2006, and 10 in 2000. Nearly all of the offenses were for child pornography. Child sex exploitation includes child sexual abuse and transportation of a child over state lines for sex.

“The number of Internet pornography arrests and convictions has more than tripled since 2000,” U.S. Attorney Catherine L. Hanaway said in November. “We’re getting at least one production or possession of child pornography every week in the eastern half of the state.”

Hanaway’s office prosecutes child pornographers through Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide program that partners federal state and local law enforcement in the effort to fight computer-based exploitation of children.

Nationally, U.S. Attorneys prosecuted 2,039 child sex exploitation cases in 2006.

Child pornography involves any visual depiction of a minor (under the age of 18) engaged in sexually explicit conduct. That could include sexual intercourse of any kind, bestiality, masturbation, sadistic or masochistic abuse or lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area.

Production of child pornography can be charged when a defendant employs, uses, persuades, induces, entices or coerces a minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct with the intent to produce a visual depiction of that conduct. It can involve production materials that traveled through interstate commerce or child pornography that has traveled through interstate commerce.

Depending on the charge and number of offenses, federal sentences for child pornography and related crimes range from 5 years to 30 years per offense. Repeat offenders can serve longer sentences.

“Child pornography is not 15-year-old girls taking their tops off,” Hanaway said. “Seventy percent of these victims are under the age of 12, 50 percent are under the age of 5, and 30 percent are younger than 3. We have even seen infants being raped.”

Hanaway said that studies indicate that for every identified victim when an offender is caught, there usually are more who do not come forward. Many of those arrested for pornography already have expanded into molestation or other forms of sexual abuse.

“It is my fondest wish we just catch people for child pornography before they touch a kid,” Hanaway said. “

Highway of opportunity

The Internet is a highway of opportunity for pedophiles, child pornographers and sexual predators who are cruising for victims, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Carrie Costantin.

Secrecy has always been part of a child exploiter’s life, and has limited his or her access to victims. Relative anonymity, ease of contact with children and the willingness of youth to communicate online with strangers contribute to the rising use of the Internet to exploit children, she explained.

Pedophiles and child pornographers use a variety of ways to contact children online, including through Yahoo groups, newsgroups, peer-to-peer opportunities such as Kazaa or LimeWire, social networking sites, Web cams, video collection sites such as YouTube, Xboxes and instant messaging.

In public or private groups, they can exchange photos or videos, and usually can chat as well. Often, conversation with potential victims as well as with other pornographers, begins in a public forum, then moves into private chat.

Most of the potential victims are 13-16 year olds, Costantin said.

The increased use of Web cams and camera phones adds to the spread of child pornography.

“If they take a photo while molesting a child, that photo inevitably gets out onto the Internet,” she said.

Creating communities

Before the Internet, it was a “lonely life” for child sexual predators, Costantin said. With the new technology, it not only is easier to find other pedophiles, but it can be done without being seen.

“One thing the Internet has done is to create communities in chat room based on topics, where people can exchange photos and videos,” she added. “There is an impression of anonymity.”

Chat rooms allow people who are attracted to children to form their own communities, where they can trade pornography, teach others how to approach children and discuss tips for grooming and molestation, Costantin said.

Although most groups have some type of moderator, private groups set up for child porn often go unnoticed until someone reports it to the Internet provider or to law enforcement, Costantin pointed out.

To catch a predator

Undercover officers on the Internet typically pose as young teenage girls. They enter sites that are likely to attract sexual predators, and engage strangers in Internet conversation.

An 2005 Internet undercover operation illustrates some of the common ways Internet predators entice children and teenagers. The Internet conversation between a predator and an undercover investigator took place in a chat room called, “I Love Older Men.”

A man began flirting with the investigator, who he thought was a 14-year-old girl. The man soon asked for more photos of her.

“He wanted proof that she was not a cop,” Costantin said. “People who are fakes usually have only one picture of themselves.”

Because the investigator knew that, there were several photos available to show the man.

In the conversation, the man asked sexual questions, finally offering to meet her to have sex. Still a bit skeptical, he wrote,

“If this is fake, I wasted a trip and a hotel room.”

Indeed, he had.

“It’s tough sometimes, being a predator on the Internet,” Costantin joked.

Getting the photos

Often, the encounters are not as much about having sex with the child as they are about preserving photos or videos of those encounters. Predators don’t usually continue to bother children who continually resist their advances, Costantin said.

“These guys don’t waste time talking to 14-year-old girls unless there’s something in it for them,” Costantin said.

When a predator finds a child who is willing to spend time talking with them, he or she often manipulate the child into providing nude photos with the use of a Web cam or a camera phone. The predator promises that the photos will not be seen by anyone else. That is usually a lie.

Sometimes, the pedophile is the one providing nude photos or doing the sexual acts. In one case, an Internet predator was caught after he showed himself performing sexual acts with a 9-year-old boy and a 3-year-old boy. One misconception about the Internet is that one can remain anonymous, whether one is commenting, sharing private information with a friend, or soliciting children for sexual exploitation.

“There is an IP address association with each posting,” Costantin said. “We can track it back to the source.”

In this case, the FBI tracked down the IP address, went to Cape Girardeau and served a search warrant. They found the man in bed, asleep, with a child. The man was arrested, convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Protecting the children

Parents, guardians and grandparents can help protect their children in several ways, Costantin suggested.

“Kids are naive and they think they can take care of themselves,” she said. “Talk to your child and grandchildren about safe use of the Internet.”

Computers should be kept in public parts of the home, not in a child’s room. Adults should monitor the child’s Internet use and establish rules and boundaries that the child must follow. Encourage your child to tell you if he or she is approached in a sexual manner on the Internet.

Parents also should contact their schools to make sure Internet safety is taught to children of all ages, Costantin added.

If children post photos on personal Web sites, nothing in the photo should provide information about the child — no school banners or jerseys with their school’s name or the name of their city. Ban the use of Web cams except under parental supervision.

Hanaway said parents should remind their children of the age-old warning against talking to strangers, and make sure they understand this applies to strangers online as well.

“Most kids won’t talk to a complete stranger on the street,” she said. “But they will on the Internet. Make sure they restrict their correspondence to people they know, not friends of friends.

“Only talk online to people you would talk to face-to-face.”

Paula Barr is a reporter for the Daily Journal and can be reached at 573-431-2010, ext. 172 or at pbarr@dailyjournalonline.com.