OTTAWA’S NEGLIGENCE OVER CHILD PORN CRITICIZED IN WAKE OF MINIMAL ARRESTS

TORONTO, January 17, 2003 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The police detective in charge of Toronto’s sex crimes unit blasted the ineffectiveness of the federal government’s child pornography strategy this week. “International co-operation is a dream, national cooperation is a nightmare,” Det.-Sgt. Paul Gillespie said, citing the mixed success of Project Snowball, the largest child-porn probe in Canadian history.  Police Canada-wide have been able to arrest only 5% of the 2,329 Canadians named on a U.S. Postal Investigative Service list of child porn consumers, because of a lack of resources. Despite the federal government’s new Bill C-15A, Ontario police Det.-Insp. Robert Matthews says it is still too difficult to investigate, charge and convict someone on child-porn charges.  Det.-Insp. Matthews cited the case of Joseph Downey, 27, of Elora, Ont., one of the suspects on the U.S. list. Downey was sentenced last October to a mere 14 months house arrest after police found more than 500 items of child porn on his computer—a sentence Matthews calls “a joke.” Some of the images of sexual acts involved infants so young that their umbilical clamps were still in place.  For newswire coverage (link valid only for a few days) see:  https://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2003/01/15/11478-cp.html   CHILD PORNOGRAPHY SENTENCES ALMOST A JOKE SAY CANADIAN POLICE https://www.fotf.ca/familyfacts/tfn/2003/011703.html