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Western New York child pornography prosecutions on the rise

Investigators are inundated with tips and the number of cases being prosecuted is nearly double that of just a few years ago.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Prosecution of child pornography cases spiked last year in Western New York. Between the U.S. Attorney’s Office and Erie County District Attorney, 80 cases were prosecuted last year. That’s almost double the number of cases prosecuted in 2017.

“There are times where we’re finding child pornography involving children who are 10 or 12 months old. That’s very shocking, seeing those images and videos and trying to figure out why someone would have interest in that stuff,” said Michael Hockwater, a detective on the FBI’s Child Exploitation Task Force.

Cases the FBI task force handle range from a man who photographed himself sexually abusing a three-year-old, to a woman who allegedly took naked images of both a one- and four-year-old, to a middle school teacher accused of using a GoPro to capture “sexually explicit” activity between two students.

For more on this story, please visit the Investigative Post website.

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