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Internet's largest child porn(1) gang smashed
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网上最大儿童色情组织被摧毁
SEVEN members of the world's largest detected Internet paedophile(2) gang face up to three years in jail after an investigation in which only a handful(3) of 1,200 child victims were identified.
As the last of the seven pleaded guilty yesterday, the former senior detective in charge of the inquiry into Wonderland, a massive database of 750,000 obscene images, called for more resources for tracing abuse victims on the Internet.
John Stewardson, formerly of the National Crime Squad, said some chief officers had criticized attempts to trace children in Britain because it was not an economic use of police resources.
The Wonderland case, which was investigated by the NCS in Operation Cathedral in September 1998, has reached the sentencing stage after a computer consultant pleaded guilty to distributing indecent images of children between November 1996 and September 1998.
Hundreds of indecent images were found at the home of Gavin Seagers, 29, of Dartford, Kent, during police raids(4). Seagers will be sentenced at Kingston Crown Court on Feb 12 and 13 with six other gang members for circulating thousands of paedophile images on encoded web sites.
The men face up to three years in jail, though the maximum sentence is to be increased to 10 years. Britain has had some of the lowest sentences for Internet porn offences in the world.
The ramifications(5) of Operation Cathedral are far deeper, however, than the sentencing of the seven, who are thought to be the last of more than 100 Wonderland members arrested worldwide to be dealt with.
NCS officers identified around 1,200 children, from all parts of the world, in the bank of 750,000 images. However, so far only around 15 children have been identified, six in Britain. The database disclosed around 180 abusers. Of the 107 men arrested worldwide, only a dozen or so have been identified as alleged abusers.
Notes:
1.porn = pornography 色情。2. 恋童癖患者。3. a handful of: 少数的。4. 突然搜捕。5. 后果。
The Daily Telegraph
January 11, 2001
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