FBI STING

FBI busts child pornography
Ring

8 - Priests!, and law enforcement workers among those arrested.

WASHINGTON, March 18 — Priests, Little League coaches, school workers and law
enforcement employees were among those arrested in a nationwide sweep that shut
down an Internet child pornography ring, federal law enforcement officials said Monday.
Forty people have been arrested, officials said, and another 50 are expected to be
arrested in the near future.

FBI Sting nets over 7000 People!

APPROXIMATELY 7,000 people were registered as members of the Candyman "e-group,"

including 2,400 people living outside the United States, Attorney General John Ashcroft

and Bruce Gebhardt, head of the FBI's Criminal Investigation Division, said at a news

conference at FBI headquarters.

The private community Web site was operated by Yahoo!, the Internet search portal, which

was not aware of the group's activities, Ashcroft said.

By midafternoon Monday, 40 people — 39 men and one woman — had been arrested in 26

states, including 27 who have been charged with molesting children, Gebhardt said. More

arrests were expected in the coming weeks and months, he said.

"As its name implies, the 'Operation Candyman' e-group had a single purpose in mind ... to

exploit and degrade children," Ashcroft said.

Gebhardt and Mike Heimbach, head of the FBI's Crimes Against Children Unit, said

authorities initially concentrated on identified members of the Candyman group who held

sensitive jobs that either involved working with children or were positions of authority.

"The first 21 arrested were in that category of significant perpetrators because they held a

position of trust," Heimbach said.

Among those arrested in the initial phase of the operation were two Roman Catholic priests

and other members of the clergy (8 Clergy Total); two law-enforcement employees; Little

League coaches, a school-bus driver and a nurse, Gebhardt said.

Few details were immediately available on the individual arrests, but Gebhardt said one of

the Catholic priests had been arrested in the Baltimore area, and one of the law enforcement

workers was a non-sworn employee of a West Virginia law enforcement agency.

Gebhardt said the FBI's Houston office had spearheaded what was dubbed Operation

Candyman, which began in January 2001, but all of the bureau's 56 field offices participated

in the investigation.

The use of the Internet to sell and trade child pornography has grown sharply in recent

years.

In 2001, the FBI's Crimes Against Children Unit opened 1,541 cases against people

suspected of using the Internet to commit crimes involving child pornography or abuse,

compared to 113 cases in 1996. The FBI had 20 employees devoted to cases involving

Internet crimes against children in 1995, compared to about 150 agents now.

In 1995, the FBI created a nationwide task force code named Innocent Images. Since then,

agents devoted to the effort have initiated over 5,700 investigations and have arrested and

convicted over 3,000 people.

U.S. law-enforcement officials and experts on pedophilia generally agree that there is a link

between child pornography and sexual abuse of children. The U.S. Postal Inspection

Service said last year that 36 percent of child pornography investigations undertaken by its

inspectors since 1997 led to child molesters.

The arrest of the priests was likely to add to the controversy swirling around recent

allegations that a handful of church clergymen, including defrocked priest John Geoghan of

Boston, were serial pedophiles. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has promised to

discuss a comprehensive national response to the issue during the bishop's next meeting in

June.