By Jocelyn Bogen
June 19, 2006

Mayors Discuss Strategies for Protecting Youth from Internet Crimes, Abduction

By Jocelyn Bogen

A special session was held June 2 on what mayors and law enforcement can do to help parents, families and communities protect children from sexual exploitation and abduction.

Elizabeth (NJ) Mayor J. Christian Bollwage moderated the session and emphasized that, “According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, one in five children is solicited online.” He added that, “In a one-year period, over 200,000 kids were the victims of family abductions, over 58,000 were abducted by non-family members; and 115 were the victims of kidnappings.”

Former Nevada Governor Bob Miller gave an overview on the National Center, whose mission is to help prevent child abduction and sexual exploitation; help find missing children; and assist victims of child abduction and sexual exploitation.

Miller was joined by Herb Jones, Vice President of External Affairs, who said that much must be done to counteract the current media and social culture of “sexually toxic” materials. He said that mayors, parents, pediatricians, and community leaders must create media and social messages that are age appropriate and let children know that sexually suggestive behavior is not appropriate. He also said that cities and states should look at the classification of sexual crimes to make sure penalties are strong enough.

Mark Epley, Senior Counsel to the Deputy U.S. Attorney General, gave an overview on the Project Safe Childhood initiative, a nation-wide effort to protect children from online exploitation and abuse. Working through every U.S. Attorneys’ offices, task forces are being formed with state and local law enforcement and community leaders to address the issue of internet predators. He urged mayors to make sure that their police forces are affiliated with these state “Internet Crimes Against Children” task forces, which will then give them access to free training on how to target predators.

Sugar Land Mayor David Wallace gave a best practices presentation on how he convened a local high school youth group known as the Sugar Land Mayor’s Youth Advisory Council (MYAC) and held follow-up meetings with the youth members, Sugar Land’s Police Chief, and a representative from the Attorney General’s Office on cyber crimes. Then MYAC members went to their former middle schools and gave presentations to the younger population often targeted by online predators.

The 45-minute presentations included eye-opening demonstrations, such as a 34-year-old, male law enforcement agent posing online as a 13-year-old girl with blonde hair and blue eyes. Not 15 minutes after entering a chat room, the fictitious young girl was propositioned. Moreover, the students were surprised to learn that it took a mere 20 minutes to target a chat room visitor named “Teresa01” and obtain a full bio that included her home address, phone number, parents’ names, school, pictures and more.

The Sugar Land Police Department then worked with the state Attorney General’s Cyber Crime Division to conduct a sting operation during which six agents simultaneously held multiple chat room conversations with various individuals. Within minutes, agents posing online as young children were propositioned, engaged in conversations and received photos that many parents would be embarrassed to even discuss with their children. In less than two weeks, these agents arrested child predators showing up at the fictitious 13-year-old child’s home and were able to execute numerous arrests and convictions.

Miami Police Chief John Timoney said that after all of his years of service, he continues to be surprised by the evidence collected in these crimes. Timoney stated, “There is a need for police departments, no matter how large or small, to train their investigators. If that means sending them away and spending some money to get internet training and computer literacy, it’s not money spent, but rather an investment in safeguarding your community.”