The FBI seal, pictured in a Getty Images photo.
The FBI seized and ran a child pornography service late
last year as investigators worked to identify its customers, one
Western Washington man allegedly among them.
Following a lengthy investigation, Nebraska-based agents raided the
large child pornography service in November hoping to catch users who
shared thousands of images showing children being raped, displayed and
abused.
The Bureau ran the service for two weeks while attempting to identify
more than 5,000 customers, according to a Seattle FBI agent's
statements to the court. Court records indicate the site continued to
distribute child pornography online while under FBI control; the
Seattle-based special agent, a specialist in online crimes against
children, detailed the investigation earlier this month in a statement
to the court.
The investigation appears to mark a departure for the Bureau and
other federal law enforcement agencies aiming to root out child porn
purveyors.
Historically, child pornography investigations stem from tips made to
law enforcement, interactions with undercover officers posing as
customers or reviews of documentation seized during searches of child
porn clearinghouses like the one recently raided in Nebraska. While
investigators are known to have posed as child porn dealers – a 2011
effort involved targeted emails to suspected pedophiles – it is not
apparent that the FBI previously dealt child porn as part of a sting.
The Nebraska investigation is still in its early stages, and, while
charges appear to be forthcoming, no one being prosecuted has been
publicly tied to the site thus far. Information obtained during the
investigation resulted in a search of one Western Washington home, and
investigators are presently reviewing computers seized during that April
search.
The FBI declined requests to discuss the investigation or
investigators’ motivations to continue operating the site. Court records
indicate investigators hoped to trace customers and were unable to do
so through traditional means.
“This remains an ongoing investigation, and local court rules and
Department of Justice policy prohibit me from providing more information
at this time,” said Sandy Breault, spokeswoman for the FBI Omaha
Division. “As in any given matter, if charges are filed, they will
eventually become a matter of public record.”
1,000s of images shared during investigation
Named only as “Website A” in an April 10 search warrant affidavit
filed by the Seattle-based agent, the child pornography service was
described as an online bulletin board with the primary business of
advertising and sharing child pornography.
The affidavit was obtained by seattlepi.com earlier in May through a
publicly accessible court records system. It has since been sealed.
Agents in the Omaha area seized “Website A” on Nov. 16 and continued
to operate it until Dec. 2, monitoring messages from users of the
website, the Seattle special agent told the court. The site was shut
down Dec. 2.
At the time the service was shuttered it had more than 5,600 users
and 24,000 posts, nearly all of which related to child pornography. At
least 10,000 photos of children being posed nude, raped or otherwise
abused were broadcast through the site.
Writing the court, the special agent recounted the site users’
discussions on how to avoid detection by police. One went so far as to
publish a lengthy guide on encryption, and protections placed on the
service impeded investigators’ work.
Most often, though, “Website A” users chatted about their shared
interests – the rape and molestation of children. Message threads on the
site included “How to lure a child in my car,” “Meeting other pedos in
real life,” and “Do kids LIKE anal sex?”
On Nov. 9, a U.S. District Court judge in Nebraska approved a request
by law enforcement agents to track down the website’s users.
According to the agent’s statement, investigators were unable to
identify “Website A” users through the service’s records. Allowing the
site to continue to operate – allowing pedophiles to continue swapping
photos and accessing images stored on the site – was necessary to
identify the customers.
Court records do not note how many images of raped and abused
children were shared or accessed while the FBI was operating “Website
A.” Investigators also do not indicate whether known victims of child
pornography – abused children pictured in widely distributed
pornographic series – have been notified photos of their abuse were
again shared as part of the investigation.
Images endure despite prosecutions
In what has become a disturbing legal cliché, federal prosecutors
often assert that each time an image of rape or molestation is shared,
the child is abused again.
That was among the arguments offered by Special Assistant U.S.
Attorney Marci Ellsworth last year when she sent a Seattle child
molester to federal prison for child pornography crimes unrelated to the
Nebraska investigation.
Ellsworth opined that Pinson’s crimes were not, as the child pornography consumers sometimes argue, “victimless.”
“Distributing of child pornography – images and videos of real
children experiencing the worst moments of their young lives – is not a
‘victimless’ crime, and the heinous nature of this offense should never
be diminished by referring to it as ‘just pictures,’” Ellsworth told the
court. “The children portrayed … suffer real and permanent damage, for
the rest of their lives, each and every time their exploitation is
shared over the Internet.”
One of those children – a girl whose father shared images of her
being abused that has since become widely shared online – put it more
bluntly in a statement to the court filed last year.
“I wish I could feel completely safe, but as long as these images are
out there, I never will,” she said in a victim impact statement.
“Every time they are downloaded, I am exploited again, my privacy is
breached, and my life feels less and less safe,” she continued. “I will
never be able to have control over who sees me raped as a child. It’s
all out there for the world to see and it can never be removed from the
internet.”
Efforts to interview a Seattle attorney representing her were
unsuccessful prior to the holiday weekend. Staff at the National Center
for Missing & Exploited Children was also unavailable to discuss the
issues surrounding the investigation.
The Seattle-area man targeted in the investigation is alleged to have
accessed a “jailbait” girls section of “Website A” 10 days after
investigators took control of it. Specifically, he’s alleged to have
accessed photos showing two men raping a 10 to 12 year old girl.
Seattlepi.com does not generally identify suspects prior to charges being filed. Charges have not yet been filed in the case.
According to the Seattle agent’s statement, the site's users
expounded on their interest in watching children be sexually assaulted
by several men at the same time, and bragged about a collection of
photos on the topic.
“There have been over 7,850 views of this thread in less than a week,
which is a great compliment to the girls!” one user said in a post,
according to a search warrant affidavit. “However, I find it hard to
believe than(sic) in the last century and a half since photography was
invented, it hasn’t occurred to more people that to photograph a cute
little girl being hard (expletive) by two men is a fine and arousing
thing to do.”
Users went on to discuss in graphic detail the practicalities of a
small girl being gang raped, according to the agent’s statement.
In a separate thread, users discussed their desire to rape children
pictured in a series of pornographic photos. One man remarked that he
would gag and chain one girl and leave another “swollen from all the
abuse,” and then days later expressed similar sentiments toward yet
another nude pre-teen girl.
“Jesus I would enjoy hurting that child,” a user said in the chat thread, according to the search warrant affidavit.
Agents began watching the Seattle-area home thought to be associated
with one user in late-March and seized computers from it on April 10.
Charges had not yet been filed in the case, and court records do not
indicate whether child pornography was recovered in the search.
