The results of one of the largest online child exploitation investigations in the history of ICE, involving victims in 39 states and five countries, were released on Tuesday. Fourteen men, including Vittorio Francesco Gonzalez-Castillo, 26, of Tucson, have been arrested and charged as part of a conspiracy to operate a a child pornography website on the Darknet’s Onion Router, also known as Tor.
The men were arrested after an extensive international investigation by ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and USPIS. Eleven have been federally charged in the Eastern District of Louisiana and three in other districts. All are in federal custody.
So far, investigators have identified 251 minor victims in 39 states and five foreign countries: 228 in the United States and 23 in the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and Belgium. Eight of the victims were female and 243 were male. The majority of victims, 159, were 13 to 15 years old. Fifty nine victims were 16 and 17; 26 victims were 10 to 12; four victims were 7 to 9; one victim was 4 to 6; and two victims were 3 years old or younger. All victims have been contacted by law enforcement, and U.S. victims offered support services from HSI victim assistance specialists.
The website’s primary administrator, Jonathan Johnson, 27, of Abita Springs, La., has been charged with operating a child exploitation enterprise. He admitted to creating multiple fake female personas on popular social networks to target and sexually exploit children and to coaching other child predators in his inner circle to do the same. Jonathan Johnson has been in federal custody since his arrest June 13, 2013, and faces 20 years to life in prison.
“Protecting children from crimes of sexual abuse and exploitation is a priority for the U.S. Postal Inspection Service,” stated Gerald O’Farrell, inspector in charge of Criminal Investigations, National Headquarters. “I’m proud of the work of the Postal Inspection Service and our investigative partners to bring child predators to justice. U.S. Postal inspectors have investigated these crimes for more than a century. While the predators’ use of sophisticated technology has evolved, the core harm has not changed: a child’s lost innocence. We will not lose sight of this and remain steadfast in our efforts to investigate, apprehend, and assist in the prosecution of those who seek to exploit children via the U.S. mail.”
The underground website was a hidden service board on the Tor network and operated from about June 2012 until June 2013, at which time the site contained more than 2,000 videos and had more than 27,000 members. The website shared webcam-captured videos of mostly juvenile boys enticed by the operators of the site to produce sexually explicit material. Tor enables online anonymity, directing Internet traffic through a volunteer network consisting of thousands of relays to conceal a user’s location.
The investigation was dubbed ‘Operation Round Table’ and began with the arrest of Jonathan Johnson by USPIS and HSI. Further computer forensic analysis by HSI revealed Jonathan Johnson to be the creator and administrator of the underground website.
Along with Gonzalez-Castillo, ten additional individuals have been arrested and charged in the Eastern District of Louisiana as the primary operators, contributors and producers of material for the child exploitation enterprise:
Daniel Nolan Devor, 39, of Brunswick, Ga., charged with conspiracy to produce child pornography, distribution of child pornography and receipt of materials involving the sexual exploitation of minors.
John C. Foster, 44, of Tipp City, Ohio, charged with conspiracy to produce child pornography, distribution of child pornography, and receipt of materials involving the sexual exploitation of minors.
Aung Gaw aka Michael Gaw, 25, of Fremont, Calif., charged with receipt of child pornography.
Sean Jabbar, 32, of Minneapolis, Minn., charged with receipt of child pornography.
Christopher Jamieson, 30, of Douglassville, Ga., charged with receipt of child pornography.
Andrew Korpal, 29, of Granger, Ind., charged with receipt of child pornography.
Nicholas Saine, 27, of Seattle, Wash., charged with receipt of child pornography.
Christopher Schwab, 25, of New Orleans, charged with production of child pornography, distribution of child pornography, and receipt of child pornography.
Stanley Zdon, III, 27, of Tuckerton, N.J., charged with conspiracy to produce child pornography.
Roy Naim, 30, of Brooklyn, N.Y., was charged in the Eastern District of New York with conspiracy to produce child pornography, attempted sexual exploitation of a child, receipt of child pornography, and possession of child pornography. Minh Vi Thong, 30, of Denver, Colo., was charged in the District of Colorado with production of child pornography, distribution of child pornography, and possession of child pornography. Michael Eales, 24, of Westby, Wis., was charged in the Western District of Wisconsin with production of child pornography. He was sentenced Oct. 29, 2013, to serve two concurrent 30-year terms in federal prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release, for manufacturing child pornography.
More than 300 investigations have been opened into potential subscribers of the website: 150 in the United States and 150 overseas. Investigators anticipate ongoing arrests and additional identification of victims as they continue to examine and analyze the more than 40 terabytes of data seized.