Posted on 04/05/2006 2:50:23 AM PDT by beyond the sea
WASHINGTON -- Justin Berry, who for five years starred in his own Web cam child pornography business, told a House panel Tuesday that the Justice Department is moving too slowly to round up 1,500 pedophiles whose information he surrendered last year.
"I believed that the government would protect the children being abused. I believed they would act quickly," Berry, now 19, told the House Energy and Commerce Committee. "I was wrong."
Justice Department spokesman Bryan Sierra disputed that, citing a threefold increase in federal prosecutions of child pornography and abuse cases nationally over the past decade. The unit investigating Berry's case, which Sierra could not discuss, has seen its workload increase 450 percent in the last four years.
"One of law enforcement's highest priorities is the protection of innocent children from sexual predators who lurk on the Internet," Sierra said.
The same committee will hear from the Justice Department, among other federal agencies, on Thursday.
Berry's story of a lonely teenager who sought friends on the Internet but instead grew rich attracting pedophiles was reported in December by the New York Times after a six-month investigation. Its author, Kurt Eichenwald, told the Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday that Berry is the first such teenage witness known to turn over such a vast cache of evidence to the government.
But even Berry's catalog of his clients' names, credit card numbers and other details has resulted in only one arrest, he and Eichenwald said.
"From the time that the government was notified of Justin's information to the point where the children in direct danger were saved, more than 50 days passed," Eichenwald told the panel. "Some people identified as perpetrators literally could not get themselves arrested if they tried."
Berry embarked on his sordid journey into the world of pedophelia and drugs when at 13, living in Bakersfield, Calif., he acquired a Web camera as part of a deal with an Internet service provider. A lonely kid of a divorced family without many friends, Berry hoped to use the device to make friends his own age.
Instead, a pedophile sent him an instant message within minutes of Berry's image landing on a Web site called Spotlife.com. More followed; then men worked to earn his trust. Senate to Vote on Amnesty for Illegals!
"At 13, I believed these people were my friends," Berry told the panel. "They were kind. They complimented me. They wanted to know about my day."
A few weeks later, he said, "everything changed" when one man proposed to pay Berry $50 to take off his shirt for a few minutes in front of the Web cam. The man helped Berry set up an account with Paypal, an online money payment system.
Last June, Eichenwald approached Berry for a story he was doing on Internet pornography. Berry agreed to help with the story and tell law enforcement what he knew about other children being exploited.
But the Justice Department and other massive federal agencies were slow to respond, Berry and Eichenwald told the panel. Berry said he has feared for his life.
Beyond - you seem to be going off the deep end, pardon the expression. The kid did not necessarily start off as a pervert; he claims (and there is no evidence to disprove his words here) that he wanted friends his own age. Broken family, lonely - the perfect target for perverts. He was gradually brought into it, the perverts "groomed" him, as they generally do. Became "friends" with him. And he had a sicko for a father.
So certainly some blame - a lot - is on his shoulders. But the fact is that he did not start off a pervert, he started off a lonely 13 year old boy, from a broken family, who had no one to guide him.
Save the rest of your crap for your Princeton "professor" (major league SICKO).............. Peter Springer.
Thrilled (barf) ............................. yes, he's a victim (barf)
Where is Monica when you need her?
The kid was a PERV BEFORE he began his sick website and that's that.
**********
By the way......................... when is being LONELY a reason to start a website that turns out to be something where you're exposing yourself to others?
Get REAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The KID was a perv and IS a perv!
You, and we, have no idea what kind of a person he was at age 13, other than what we've read in this and other articles.
You've gone off the deep end.
When I think back to myself at age 13 - or even the mature age of 15 or 16 - it's only divine intervention that saved me from degradation and vice that would have ruined my life. Maybe not the exact same kind (didn't have the internet then) but there was plenty around.
"The insensitive ass of a freeper" -- tough words from you ...... at least you could have pinged me. ;-)
Five years of making money by selling your body is perverted behavior ..... plain and simple. If you don't think so, there is nothing to be said.
By the way, with all that you may have learned (or not learned) about this character, have you seen mentioned anywhere in the reportage just how much money he made over the years selling his wares?
Just wondering.
This is just one more letter of the alphabet to be added to the GLBT alliance.
I hear you......... I agree.
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