Sex Crime Cases
Please Note: These cases and articles are very disturbing and not intended for children and adolescents.
These cases involve exploitation, rape, abuse, sexual assault, and death of children, adolescents, and, in some instances, adults. This is not only a U.S. problem; this is a global issue. Innocent children, adolescents, and adults are being used for sexual gratification and money by means of social media, the Internet, and electronic devices; afterward they are discarded with no sense of remorse or regret, which is comparable to a present-day “Holocaust.” These crimes against humanity need to be exposed and the people involved brought to justice regardless of race, nationality, religious beliefs, age, or gender.
Child Pornography
Newark, New Jersey – A Ukrainian man, federal prosecutors said, who may be the most significant distributor of child pornography ever prosecuted in the United States, was charged in New Jersey on Monday with operating a network of Web sites. Maksym Shynkarenko, a 33-year-old from Kharkov, Ukraine, founded and operated a Ukraine-based child pornography Web site that had customers around the world and has resulted in 560 convictions throughout the U.S. alone. A 32-count indictment released Monday against Shynkarenko says he traded in tens of thousands of hardcore pornographic images and videos that depicted children ranging from infants to toddlers and teenagers being graphically sexually assaulted or abused, in most cases by adults. In some cases, the videos were submitted by customers – later prosecuted – who had filmed themselves molesting children, according Paul Fishman, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey.
- The China Post, Alleged child pornography distributor charged in US; June 13, 2012 [5]
Cedric Lovejoy, 29, of Plato, was undergoing a polygraph test for a Missouri State Highway Patrol job in November 2012 when he was asked if he had ever committed any criminal offense. He responded that he had “engaged in sexual acts with three minor females and recorded the acts on several different occasions.” Three weeks later, the patrol served a search warrant on Lovejoy’s home and found video footage recorded in July 2009 of a 14-year-old performing a sex act on him; Lovejoy was 23 at the time the video was recorded. He was sentenced August 6, 2015 to 20 years in prison.
- The New York Times, Missouri man gets 20 years for making child porn, August 6, 2015 [11]
Federal Bureau of Investigation search warrant provides a look at efforts to combat child pornography online, leading to the seizure of a Web site with 215,000 users. The search warrant showed the FBI seized the Web site’s North Carolina server on February 20, 2015 but allowed it to remain operating for about two weeks while authorities investigated its users. The Web site, initiated August 2014, contained thousands of postings and messages featuring child pornography images.
- The New York Times, FBI seized child porn Web site with 215,000 users, July 7, 2014 [13]
Do parents know who their children are interacting with on Facebook?: Case in point, a 23-year-old California man was recently sentenced to 29 years in federal prison for attempting to produce child pornography and enticing a minor. Jordan James Kirby used Facebook to solicit juvenile girls (as well as women) for sexually explicit photos, which he would then use to extort the victims for additional pictures and/or for sex acts with him.
- Federal Bureau of Investigation, July 30, 2015 [3]
Stephen Howells and girlfriend Nicole Vaisey were charged by federal prosecutors with coercing and sexually exploiting two Amish girls and other children. Both have pleaded guilty to child pornography charges, remain jailed and await sentencing. Howells on Friday admitted he pushed the girls into a car his girlfriend was driving. Authorities say he lured the girls with a dog. He faces 25 years in prison. His girlfriend also has pleaded guilty to kidnapping. The Amish girls were 7 and 11 years old. They were abducted from their family’s roadside Amish farm stand.
- The New York Times, Man convicted of child porn and kidnapping, July 17, 2015 [12]
Child Pornography: Couple contacted local authorities after seeing digital pornographic pictures of a child that were provided to him by Patricia Ayers. The Lauderdale County Sheriff’s Office with a warrant seized computers, cell phone, cameras, and electronic storage media devices. Patricia Ayers admitted taking the images of the child, initially claiming they were taken for the purposes of documenting a rash – was arrested.
- Federal Bureau of Investigation, November 13, 2014 [4]
Sexual Assault/Rape
4 year old girl was raped and died Monday from cardiac arrest at Care Hospital in Nagpur, India. It is the latest in a number of assaults that caused outrage and raised questions about how women and girls are treated in India. The girl was allegedly abducted from Ghansaur, a small town in central India, on April 17, and her family found her the next day, unconscious and with severe head injuries. She was airlifted to the hospital in Nagpur and put on a ventilator but did not survive. A 35-year-old man, Firoz Khan, confessed to the rape, has been arrested and accused of sexually assaulting the girl.
- CNN News, May 1, 2013 [15]
11 year old girl was gang raped under a bridge in Tehran. The crime was unfortunately largely overshadowed by the nuclear negotiations between Iran and world powers. Regardless, the case will still not be investigated because in Iran there are complicated laws that make it very difficult for women to prove they have been raped and in some cases these laws can lead to rape victims being punished. Iranian government is still not prepared to seriously confront the issue of rape and violence against women in Iranian society. This is most likely one reason why many women in Iran prefer to not report being raped to the police.
- Al Monitor, Rape of young girl met with muted response, July 24, 2015 [18]
Marilyn Pharis, 64, in Santa Maria, Calif., was raped and slain with a hammer by an illegal immigrant with a long criminal record who’d been arrested and let go days before the attack! Victor Aureliano Martinez Ramirez, 29, who’s charged along with Jose Fernando Villagomez, 20, in the attack, was on probation for committing battery against a woman and methamphetamine possession in May 2014. A Santa Barbara judge allowed him to enter a substance abuse center in Santa Maria in lieu of jail. Pharis, a civilian employee at the Vandenberg Air Force Base and a military service veteran, was sleeping after a night shift when two men allegedly broke into her home, bludgeoned her with a claw hammer, strangled and raped her and left her for dead. She died days later at a hospital.
- News Max/Fox News Reports, August 7, 2015 [16]
Sexual predators in 2013 assaulted 14-year-old girl for five days in Birmingham. Two men are jailed for 15 years Raja Khan, 23 of Sparkbrook, Birmingham, punched and raped victim while Adeeb Sultan, 27 of Alum Rock, Birmingham, abused her. Sultan also passed her to another man who sexually assaulted her. Police officer described the abuse as “truly despicable”! On one occasion the men tried to force the girl to perform a sex act on a taxi driver in a bid to get a lower fare. In one frenzied attack, in which she was punched in the face, Khan said that if she refused to have sex, her friend would be raped instead. Despite suffering horrific injuries, the victim managed to run away.
- Daily Mail UK, March 1, 2013 [14]
Social media can be dangerous for young people: A Houston man was sentenced to 40 years in prison on child sex trafficking charges after identifying and contacting young girls through social media platforms and then luring them into prostitution.
- Federal Bureau of Investigation, October 14, 2014 [2]
An American woman was gang raped and beaten across the face aboard a public transport van by three men 20 to 22 while her French boyfriend was handcuffed, hit with a crowbar and forced to watch the attacks. The victims were in Brazil as students, took a public transport van from Rio’s Copacabana beach neighborhood to the nightlife hot spot of Lapa in downtown Rio. The three suspects also went on a spending spree with the foreigners’ credit cards. The two were ultimately dumped by the side of a highway near the city of Itaborai, some 50 kilometers from Rio. The suspects committed another rape, a young Brazilian woman came forward to say that she too was raped by the same men.
- Fox News, April 2, 2013 [17]
If you have any information that can help stop this devastation of innocent life, contact the proper authorities. Organizations and the phone numbers are as follows:
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Child Exploitation Investigations Unit 1-866-DHS-2-ICE
www.ice.gov
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Human Trafficking/Child Pornography & Exploitation 1-800-225-5324
www.fbi.gov
Note: If for some reason, the FBI or ICE cannot be reached, contact the local or state authorities.
References
[2] https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2014/october/sex-trafficker-receives-40-year-sentence/sex-trafficker-receives-40-year-sentence
[3] https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2015/july/sexual-predator-sentenced-to-29-years/sexual-predator-sentenced-to-29-years
[4] https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2014/november/child-pornography-case-results-in-lengthy-prison-sentences/child-pornography-case-results-in-lengthy-prison-sentences
[5] http://www.chinapost.com.tw/international/americas/2012/06/13/344225/Alleged-child.htm
[11] http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/08/06/us/ap-us-child-porn-lie-detector.html
[12] http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/07/17/us/ap-us-missing-amish-girls-guilty.html
[13] http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2015/07/07/us/07reuters-usa-crime-childporn.html
[14] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2286673/Sexual-predators-assaulted-14-year-old-girl-FIVE-DAYS-jailed-15-years.html#ixzz3l4eeNhzt
[15] http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/01/world/asia/india-girl-raped/index.html
[16] http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/illegal-immigration-rape-murder/2015/08/07/id/669120/
[17] http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/04/02/american-woman-reportedly-held-for-hours-victim-gang-rape-in-brazil/
[18] http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/07/iran-rape-11-year-old.html#
“These girls, regardless of age, participating in porn videos and photos are daughters but they could also be a mother, sister, niece, or cousin and likewise with the boys. Most likely, they have been either sexually abused, raped, assaulted, exploited, forced or sold into some type of sexual condition or place. At least one point, they have been asked to perform acts that are disgusting and deplorable. If they pass unscathed by what I have just mentioned, then most likely, it is because no one was there to help them!”
“What is our responsibility to humanity, to the children of this world, the next generation? Are we to say, as long as it is not happening in my home or neighborhood I don’t care? Let’s forget, just for a minute, that compassion and love is not a factor, can you tell if anyone of these boys or girls will or will not make a contribution to society? Any one of these girls and boys has the potential to be a doctor, engineer, or even an honest lawyer and politician. Take it one step further and think they could be the next Louis Pasteur, Margaret Thatcher, Emmitt Smith, J. K. Rowling, Leonardo Da Vinci, or Mother Teresa. With what these people have achieved in the arena of sports, science, politics, arts and religion, who wouldn’t want to help these boys and girls overcome a disastrous life without purpose. But it’s not just about contribution, it is about the heart that beats in every man and woman. It is this heart that the Lord has given us that controls our ability to do what is right and good in this world.”
“If I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, and it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres.”
(1 Corinthians 13:2–6 NIV)
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
(Matthew 22:37–40 NIV)
“Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, and faithful in prayer. Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.”
(Romans 12:9–13 NIV)
“Who is your neighbor and the Lord’s people? – Everyone! This includes all the girls and boys suffering unspeakable sexual crimes!”
What do you think of, other than sex, when watching girls or boys, women or men in sexual pornographic videos or photos? Would you care if your mother, sister, daughter, niece, or cousin were performing sexual acts for pleasure and money? Would you help them, or just enjoy the profits? Would you allow them to be exploited, abused, raped, assaulted, or forced into sexual slavery? I think the answer would be no. So why do you continue to look at images where other people have; are they not just as worthy to be granted the opportunity to have a decent life without tragedy caused by the pursuit of filthy sex and money? Every time you look at free or purchased pornographic photos or videos, the merciless villains are encouraged to produce more and continue to mistreat the innocent.”
- Scott Wilson, Executive Director, Christ Against Pornography