A Department of Internal Affairs-led investigation has led to a child victim being rescued, a network of seven New Zealand paedophiles being charged, and more than 12,000 pieces of child sexual abuse material being located.
Warning: This article includes details of assaults on very young people that may be distressing to readers.
Operation AB was launched by Internal Affairs’ Digital Child Exploitation Team following an alert from US-based National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children about an offender distributing images of child sexual exploitation and abuse via an online messaging platform.
The operation led the exploitation team and police to apprehending the seven men and laying 41 charges including indecent acts on a child and the creation, possession and distribution of objectionable material.
One member of the network, a 55-year-old man, has been imprisoned for more than four years after pleading guilty to one count of an indecent act on a child.
Many of the children featured in the images and videos were infants being exposed to “obvious and intentional” pain and suffering.
Exploitation team manager Tim Houston said these individuals had a “clear sexual interest” in the “sadistic” sexual abuse of babies and children.
Dedicated investigators and forensic specialists from Internal Affairs, NZ Police, NZ Customs and Oranga Tamariki had spent four years working to identify, investigate and prosecute the offenders, he added.
“The material shared amongst these individuals was horrendous and it was imperative that we brought them to justice before they were able to do even more damage.”
Of the seven offenders, three have been imprisoned and one was given home detention. Three others have since died.
