Officials in New York say they have arrested 71 people for possessing and trading child pornography via the Internet in what's being described as the largest-ever such operation in the city.
Member station WNYC's Annemarie Fertoli reports that the five-week investigation, called Operation Caireen, was led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and yielded some 600 computers, tablets and smartphones containing thousands of images of children exchanged via peer-to-peer networks.
Special Agent James Hayes called the images depraved and shocking and said that the perpetrators weren't just stereotypical drifters. "They worked as nurses, paramedics, caretakers for mentally ill adults, computer programmers and architects," Hayes said. "One was an airline pilot, and one was a police officer."
Hayes says the arrests included 70 men and one woman.
The Associated Press quotes authorities as saying that an alarming number of the defendants had access to young children, though there were no reports of abuse.
A Boy Scout leader coached a youth baseball team; a rabbi home-schooled his children and others. Another person used hidden cameras to secretly film his children's friends, the AP says.
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