The U.S. Department of Justice has released its first National Strategy to Combat Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction. The strategy builds upon the department’s accomplishments in combating child exploitation by establishing specific, aggressive goals and priorities and increasing cooperation and collaboration at all levels of government and the private sector.
As part of the overall strategy, the U.S. Marshals Service is launching a nationwide operation targeting the top 500 most dangerous, non-compliant sex offenders in the nation. Additionally, the department will create a national database to allow federal, state, tribal, local and international law enforcement partners to deconflict their cases with each other, engage in undercover operations from a portal facilitated or hosted by the database, share information and intelligence and conduct analysis on dangerous offenders and future threats and trends. The department also created 38 additional assistant U.S. attorney positions to devote to child exploitation cases and over the coming months will work to fill the vacancies and train the new assistants in the specialized area.
“Although we’ve made meaningful progress in protecting children across the country — in rural areas, inner cities, tribal communities and online — and although we’ve brought a record number of offenders to justice in recent years, it is time to renew our commitment to this work,” U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said. “Congress has rightly called for such an approach — and for more aggressive enforcement of laws aimed at safeguarding our children and preventing, stopping and punishing child exploitation crimes. The Justice Department is fully committed to answering this call.”
Said U.S. Attorney Edward J. Tarver: “The National Strategy’s threat assessment makes clear that child exploitation, often over the Internet, has reached epidemic proportions. This disturbing development demands we act with the full force of the department and its many law enforcement partners. We will settle for nothing less than reducing incidents of child exploitation and bringing justice to those who would steal the innocence of our nation’s children.”
Since fiscal year 2006, the Department of Justice has filed 8,464 Project Safe Childhood cases against 8,637 defendants. In the Southern District of Georgia, 50 defendants have been charged under the Project Safe Childhood initiative since 2006.
These cases include prosecutions of online enticement of children to engage in sexual activity, interstate transportation of children to engage in sexual activity, production, distribution and possession of child pornography and other offenses.
