Protecting Children and Online Predators

"Take a breath"

That is one thing that I said to myself often when I was assigned to work Internet Crimes Against Children. This was one of the darkest things I have ever witnessed and a job that requires extreme mental toughness. It is not normal to see some of the things that ICAC investigators see when they are investigating these monsters. Every image must be viewed; every video must be seen in its entirety. It takes a special person to effectively work cases involving Child Sexual Abuse Material and the cases are not slowing down.

In 2024 the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received 20.5 million reports with 29.2 million incidents. That's roughly 1,400 reports per day that contained chats, files, or other information indicating the NCMEC report was potentially time sensitive.

The Wilson County Sheriff's Office has worked Internet Crimes Against Children and will continue to do so under my leadership. We will aggressively pursue those that want to exploit children. We will work with our local, state, and federal partners to locate individuals who are preying on children or exploiting children in online platforms.

We will be proactive in these investigations, but also proactive in awareness and educating citizens, church groups, parents, and children through presentations at schools, churches etc. to raise awareness and prevent our children from being exploited.

I bet someone reading this post has a child that plays on a tablet or cellphone. I am guilty too. Tablets and smartphones have become a new age "babysitter". Kids of all ages use these devices and become emersed in the games. Some of these massive online platforms and game creation systems average about 85.3 million daily active visitors.

To a child predator these platforms become a hunting ground, looking for an innocent victim. The games on some of these platforms are user created and offer chat rooms or peer 2 peer chatting. That is where it starts.

I will spare you the details of cases that I have experienced and how these seemingly innocent online chatting/gaming platforms quickly turn into a child being sexually exploited for someone else's sexual pleasure or monetary gain.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children also estimates that approximately 36 children are sexually exploited each day on "Roblox". Parents, take the device and ensure that the parental controls are enabled. Turn off in game chats, private messaging, stranger interactions and mature content. Make sure that content is age appropriate.

The best way to curb this is education. Educating parents, guardians, teachers, adults, and other stakeholders to prevent it before it starts, but investigate it to the MAX once it's happened and hunt those that hide behind IP addresses, VPN's, screennames or hidden profiles. We will hunt these sick individuals down, we will expose them and we will put their real identity out for all to see and bring them to justice.

Under my leadership we will have dedicated trained specialized investigators assigned to work the hundreds of tips that come in from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. We will continue to work with our partners at the State Bureau of Investigation, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and any other three letter agency or local agency that shares the common goal of protecting our children. I have already spoken with an individual that works with a local non-profit that assists by providing training, education and resources to parents, children, teachers, and even law enforcement. Having partnerships across the board is key.

To those that wish to exploit children; your time is coming. We will use every resource available to us. We will find you; we will expose you and we will bring you to justice.