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WASHINGTON
— A Wisconsin man was found guilty
yesterday in the Western District of
Louisiana for his participation in an
international criminal network, known as
Dreamboard, dedicated to the sexual
abuse of children and the creation and
dissemination of graphic images and
videos of child sexual abuse throughout
the world.
The
investigation was conducted by U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement's
(ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI),
the Child Exploitation Investigations
Unit of ICE's Cyber Crime Center, the
Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section
(CEOS) of the U.S. Department of
Justice's Criminal Division, CEOS's High
Technology Investigative Unit and 35 HSI
offices in the United States and 11 HSI
attaches offices in 13 countries around
the world, with assistance from numerous
local and international law enforcement
agencies across the United States and
throughout the world.
John Wyss,
aka "Bones," 55, of Monroe,
Wis., was found guilty of one count of
engaging in a child exploitation
enterprise, one count of conspiracy to
advertise child pornography and one
count of conspiracy to distribute child
pornography. Evidence presented at trial
revealed that Wyss had been an active
member of Dreamboard, an online child
pornography bulletin board, since
January 2008 and had made numerous
postings revealing that he had produced
child pornography by capturing images of
minors engaging in sexually explicit
activity via webcam, including one video
in which adult males were engaged in
sexual intercourse with prepubescent
girls.
Wyss was
charged in an indictment unsealed Aug.
3, 2011.The charges against Wyss are
the result of Operation Delego, an
ongoing investigation that was launched
in December 2009 that targeted
individuals around the world for their
participation in Dreamboard. Dreamboard
was a private, members-only, online
bulletin board that was created and
operated in an environment designed to
avoid law enforcement detection. It
promoted pedophilia and encouraged the
sexual abuse of very young children.
"Wyss
and the other conspirators of the
nightmare called Dreamboard mistakenly
believed that they could commit heinous
crimes against children and hide in the
shadows," said ICE Director John
Morton. "Criminals with this kind
of depravity in mind should know that
ICE's Homeland Security Investigations
is ever vigilant. For every tactic taken
to evade law enforcement, we will adapt
our strategies to find them and
prosecute them to the fullest extent of
the law."
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