A Vancouver high school teacher who allegedly accessed child pornography from his school’s computers is one of two B.C. men now linked to a global pornography ring that operated through Facebook.
Christopher Ingvaldson, 40, was charged in early June with four counts relating to child exploitation, but accusations of his involvement in the exploitation network were only revealed Friday.
RCMP say a Kelowna, B.C., man was also arrested in June on similar information forwarded by Australian authorities who cracked the alleged ring. He was released, but police are still expecting to recommend charges.
“Even though the source of where this information came from is the same in both cases, the circumstances in terms of where the suspect lives is different,” said Sgt. Tony Cavezza, with Vancouver Police.
Six people in Britain and three in Australia have also been arrested.
The Canadian Police Centre for Missing and Exploited Children was tipped to the investigation once it became clear there were Canadians involved, said spokeswoman RCMP Sgt. Lana Prosper.
“There are more files being investigated in Canada,” Prosper said. “Whether they lead to charges or not would be up to those specific agencies.”
Australian officials said they were at first furious with Facebook, which they say had discovered the illicit profiles but failed to notify police.
The 11 men allegedly set up multiple accounts on the popular social network site under fake names to trade thousands of images and videos of “adults and children engaged in sexual behaviour,” said Neil Gaughan of the Australia Federal Police.
“We are aware that Facebook knew of the existence of these pages and even went so far as to remove the profiles,” Gaughan told the Sydney Morning Herald.
Facebook had deactivated the suspects’ online accounts, he said, but their profiles were recreated within hours.
Facebook’s “lack of cooperation and their lack of proactive assistance to law enforcement could lead to a child assaulted,” Gaughan said.
Australian police said they infiltrated the alleged network after a covert officer established a Facebook profile and was approached by one of the suspects.
But in an about-face, Gaughan said that once the investigation began, Facebook worked closely with police. He called the site’s cooperation “integral to bringing down this international child pornography syndicate.”
Unlike in the United States, where social media sites are legally required to turn in illegal content to authorities, websites would only be morally obligated to do so in Canada, said RCMP Sgt. Lana Prosper.
“(But if) there was (an incident) in Canada, I would think they would report it to us,” she said. “I just don’t think they’re actively out there looking for it on their site.”
She added: “There are some popular websites that we get a lot of investigations from.
The investigation, dubbed Project Ocean, began in March in conjunction with the RCMP, British authorities and the FBI.
Earlier this week, the alleged group’s British ringleader was jailed for four years for sharing more than 100,000 indecent images of children.
In a statement, Facebook said it works closely with police services around the world to “bring these criminals to justice.” Mygripe
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