With the lightest of sentences handed out to these men, they will be back in business. Do they live near you? Have you heard about a local Eastbourne International paedophile ring?
Admitting leading an international paedophile ring distributing millions of obscene photographs and films of children to customers in more than 40 countries, three men were imprisoned.
Admitted several accusations of creating, distributing, and having obscene images of children, Ian Frost, 35, his civil partner Paul Rowland, 34, and Frost’s brother Paul, 37 In England and Wales, this was the first instance of its sort which individual defendants were punished for spreading such photos via news servers.
Following their operation, Lincolnshire police claimed that 132 children in the UK had been granted protection and several paedophiles had been taken from positions of trust, including teachers, doctors, youth workers, and police officers.
Ian Frost was the “leading light, who devised the scheme and was the main beneficiary,” Mr Justice Calvert-Smith told Nottingham Crown Court. He spent thirty-three months behind Rowland.
Lincolnshire police claimed the group ran unlawful, uncensored internet newsgroups distributing photographs and films to 46 nations worldwide. The US had been the base of most of the subscribers.
Rowland confessed to distributing, creating and having obscene photos of children, while the three men also pleaded guilty to disseminating such images. The court praised the intricate police and law enforcement agency inquiry as “painstaking and groundbreaking”.
While a fourth man, 32-year-old Ian Sambridge, of St Albans, Hertfordshire, who acknowledged disseminating obscene photos of children, was handed a 12-month sentence suspended for two years and 240 hours of community service, Paul Frost from Sheffield was imprisoned for 15 months.
“It is amazing that four such people, well-educated, should decide to follow the path they did,” the judge said. It’s similarly startling that for the victims shown in their newsgroups, hardly a word of regret has come out of any defendant’s mouth during the seven-year inquiry.”
A senior officer claimed the men’s breadth and scope of worldwide internet operations stunned the police.
Detective Superintendent Paul Gibson led the investigation and said officers from the Lincolnshire police understood experts would be required for forensic analysis when they entered Ian Frost’s living room and discovered the piece of computer equipment running the news servers.
The technically sophisticated news service was run from Martin Dales, a little hamlet close to Woodhall Spa, north of Boston.
“Never once did the defendants pause to reflect that they were contributing significantly to the international market and the abuse of children, and even if that did not concern them, they did not consider that they were at risk of criminal prosecution,” the judge said. Although none seemed to live lavish lifestyles, the illicit operation lasted seven years, bringing the group roughly £2.2m.
German police first sent intelligence to police officials in November 2005, indicating Ian Frost was running a news service with links to obscene photographs of youngsters.
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