The bad guys are still out there. After announcing the largest child pornography sweep in Ontario history, police say thousands more people are still suspected.
More disturbing are the countless young victims who continue to be abused.
At a news conference Thursday, police said 213 charges were laid against 60 people. Yet the Ontario Provincial Police and partner agencies said they’ve only started to skim the surface of child exploitation.
Those 60 individuals are alleged to be the worst of the worst. Police said limited resources mean investigators can’t possibly catch them all.
“We’re not going to arrest our way out of this problem,” said OPP Insp. Scott Naylor, manager of the OPP’s Child Sexual Exploitation Section. “That’s why we have to focus on public education and awareness as well.”
Fourteen of those arrested are from the GTA, with the rest coming from across the province, including London, Hamilton and Ottawa.
The accused range in age from 16 to 69. Among those charged in the GTA are a private school support worker and a former child pornography offender.
The sweep also identified 22 underage victims, all in Ontario, and removed them from dangerous situations.
That alone is reason to celebrate, police said.
“The 60 people who are arrested, that’s good,” Naylor said. “But it’s the 22 kids that aren’t being victimized today that were being victimized yesterday. That’s what makes my heart feel good.”
And with advancing technology police say their investigators are getting faster and smarter at keeping up with offenders.
Police used tools and software developed in-house to track 8,940 unique Internet protocol addresses where porn is suspected to have been downloaded in the past three months, said OPP Det.-Staff Sgt. Frank Goldschmidt.
At the Vaughan news conference, those IP addresses were displayed as an overwhelming number of red dots on a map of Ontario.
Using that information, police surfed through incriminating material to execute warrants or request the name and location of suspects registered at the IP addresses from Internet service providers.
Goldschmidt said keeping on top of new ways to store and transmit child pornography is a constant challenge. “So we’re developing some of these tools to help us out and identify these people.”
Among those charged is Bret Sheppard, 51, of Mississauga, a former support worker for Lynn-Rose Heights Private School in Mississauga.
Sheppard was employed by parents to help children in the classroom, the school said in a release.
“He is no longer employed in these capacities, and no longer has access to school property,” the statement said.
Steven Ernest Slade, 44, of Scarborough is charged with two counts of luring a child and breach of probation, as well as counselling to commit an indictable offence.
In 2009, the Windsor Star reported a Steven Ernest Slade was arrested after police were tipped to his apartment and found 568 images and 165 digital movies he’d shared online. They also discovered chat logs with sexually disturbing content.
Slade pleaded guilty to charges of possession of child pornography, luring and counselling someone to commit an indictable offence.
Police said additional arrests could be made and more victims identified in the massive investigation by the Provincial Strategy to Protect Children from Sexual Abuse and Exploitation on the Internet.
Since 2006, police have laid 5,837 charges against 1,867 people as part of the provincial strategy.
“The sweep carried out over the past few days serves as another wakeup call to those who commit these monstrous crimes against children,” said the OPP’s acting commissioner, Scott Tod.
“You cannot hide your crimes. You cannot hide your identities. We are looking and we will stop you from victimizing our children.”
Others charged in the GTA: Shiraz Nariman, 42, of Toronto, Henning Winifried Jonat, 47, Toronto, Clifford Hollis Lewis, 46, Toronto, Jay Newell Thomas, 38, Toronto, Earl Everett Pond, 52, Pickering, Beverly Joe Gilbert, 35, Oshawa, Thomas Hardcastle, 22, Bowmanville, Derek Pearl, 59, Newmarket, Carlo Carparelli, 48, Markham, Philip Prouse, 27, Markham, Carman Batchelor, 56, Brampton, and Jose Luis Sobarzo-Hernandez, 21, Mississauga.
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