Police ‘bust child porn network’

3 December 2003

AMSTERDAM — Police claim the arrest of seven men during raids on 18 addresses across the country has broken up one of the Netherlands’ largest child pornography networks.

A large amount of pornography is also alleged to have been seized in the weekend raids and police claim the network organised sex holidays to Tunisia and countries in Eastern Europe, such as Romania and the Czech Republic.

The arrested suspects are believed to be the network leaders and are aged between 30 and 74. The raids were carried out by 200 police officers in 15 cities and allegedly resulted in the seizure of sex travel material, plus videotapes, photos and CD-Roms containing child pornography.

Inquires are now under way to determine if the network was involved in the production and distribution of child pornography, Radio Netherlands reported on Wednesday.

The arrests came after police were tipped-off that several suspects were guilty of abusing underage boys. Further arrests have not been ruled out.

Meanwhile, in a separate case, 16 police raids on Tuesday resulted in the arrest of two men, from Sneek and Nunspeet, and the alleged seizure of a large amount of child pornography. Police seized 28 computers, 70 hard discs and hundreds of CDs and DVDs.

The men are accused of using the software of Kazaa, which allows computers users to share and exchange files across the globe, newspaper Algemeen Dagblad reported. Authorities were tipped off by child pornography reporting group, Meldpunt Kinderporno.

Several of the people held were allegedly offering a large amount of child pornography via Kazaa, including images of very young children. The material was being spread both in the Netherlands and the US, but it remains unclear whether the suspects produced the material themselves.

Dutch justice officials have passed on the information of 10 American suspects to US authorities.

[Copyright Expatica News 2003]

Subject: Dutch news