Tag Archive for: child

Rogersville Man Sentenced to 30 Years for Child Sexual Exploitation, Illegal Firearms, Nearly $1 Million Investment Fraud Scheme | USAO-WDMO

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SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – A Rogersville, Missouri, man was sentenced in federal court today for three separate cases in which he was convicted of child sexual exploitation, a nearly $1 million investment fraud scheme, and illegally possessing 19 firearms.

Roy G. Harris, Jr., 57, was sentenced by U.S. Chief District Judge Beth Phillips to 30 years in federal prison without parole. Harris was sentenced to 20 years on the child exploitation offenses, five years on the wire fraud offense, and five years on the firearms offenses, for a total of 30 years.

The court also ordered Harris to pay $809,260 in restitution to the victims of his wire fraud scheme and $5,000 to the victim of his child sexual exploitation and child pornography crimes.

On Feb. 27, 2019, Harris pleaded guilty to a one-count information charging him with wire fraud. He was indicted in a second case on Aug. 23, 2019, and on a third case on March 23, 2021. On Aug. 3, 2021, Harris pleaded guilty to all three counts of the second case – one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm, one count of possessing an illegal firearm, and one count of unlawfully possessing an unregistered firearm. On Aug. 19, 2021, Harris pleaded guilty to both counts of the third case – one count of the sexual exploitation of a minor and one count of receiving and distributing child pornography.

Regarding his wire fraud conviction, Harris admitted that he engaged in an investment fraud scheme from June 2014 to May 2017. The total loss to victims of his fraud was at least $921,250. Harris has paid back some of the money to various investors.

Harris was the owner of two limited liability companies, Orthogistic, LLC, and Amniogistic, LLC. He was also the owner of a corporation, Orthogistic Labs, Inc. He solicited investments from individuals, including a victim identified in court documents as “P.K.,” a resident of New Jersey who invested $60,000 in Orthogistic Labs, Inc. Harris made representations to these individuals that he knew were false, and used some of the money obtained from his victims for other purposes and for his personal benefit. Harris failed to tell investors that he had been convicted in 2002 of the felony crimes…

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Child identity theft a growing problem, how to protect your family

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KUTV —

Your child could have had their identity stolen, and most parents wouldn’t even know it. In the United States child ID fraud impacts one in every 50 children, and costs families nearly $1 billion a year.

Britta Clarck, with the Better Business Bureau Mountain West, said the cases of child identity theft are growing. But there are ways to protect your family, and make sure people are not opening credit cards or committing fraud in your child’s name.

Children make great targets for identity fraud for multiple reasons.

“They’re starting off with this clean blank slate of this child’s credit, first of all,” said Clark. “Then secondly you have the time that it takes to uncover these fraud attempts.”

The thieves can take a child’s personal information and use it to apply for benefits like healthcare, open bank, or credit accounts, apply for loans, sign up for utilities, or even rent a home.

Clark said it can take years, even decades before anyone notices the damage.

“And oftentimes the parents may never notice. And it’s the child who finds out when they grow up and try to start having credit lines of their own.”

Children with unmonitored access to the internet and social media are more likely to be targeted.

“Those scams can be you’ve won something from Minecraft. Or you have this chance to meet your favorite celebrity or athlete and you just need to fill out this information.”

Clark said kids don’t always know that some information is not meant for strangers. Scammers may even pose as a child’s friend online, while they are actually fishing for identity information.

“So they could say oh what’s your name, what’s your parents’ names, where do you live?”

Parents may often miss red flags, writing them off as junk mail or spam.

“You should be monitoring your child’s credit just like you monitor your own,” she said.

Signs of child ID theft include calls or letters about bills in your child’s name or taxes they owe. Parents being turned down for government benefits or a child’s student loan application being denied are other signs.

To protect your children, teach them about internet security, and what is considered private information.

You can also check their credit for free once a…

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Hacker Risks Jail to Out Middlebury College Employee for Alleged Child Porn

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A hacker working for a security firm got the shock of their life last month when they stumbled across what appeared to be a Middlebury College employee’s stash of child pornography while hunting for vulnerable computers.



a close up of a keyboard: (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

© Provided by The Daily Beast
(Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

The hacker was faced with a moral quandary: alert law enforcement to their findings and risk criminal charges for hacking—or say nothing and live with a guilty conscience knowing a possible child abuser is on the prowl.

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But when they found a picture of the alleged voyeur’s driver’s license on his computer, they decided to take a chance with law enforcement and turn the man in, according to an affidavit obtained by The Daily Beast.

By doing so, the hacker revealed they had broken into the computer and had likely violated the law—but the gamble paid off.

Prosecutors eventually offered the hacker immunity for their cooperation, and the alleged voyeur, Scott I. Remick, a senior technology specialist for Middlebury College in Vermont, was arrested Wednesday for possessing child porn, according to court documents obtained by The Daily Beast. The court documents, unsealed late Wednesday, do not identify the security researcher, whose involvement is somewhat convoluted.

Upon finding the explicit images, the hacker, who was hunting for machines vulnerable to a specific kind of flaw as part of their work with a security research group, established backdoor access to Remick’s computer before handing off the case to law enforcement. They claimed they did so out of a fear that law enforcement officials might not be able to properly investigate the child pornography if they lost access to the trove of pornographic files.

Then, the hacker submitted a report to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) that they observed Remick communicating with a young girl named “Jeanie” over a Tor network. The researcher told NCMEC they suspected Remick was either sharing explicit images with Jeanie or in a relationship with her, according to the affidavit.

“What I saw shook me to my core and I honestly could have never imagined being here in this position,” the…

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Mexico boosts border security to stop child migrants

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posted March 22, 2021 at 09:00 am

by 
AFP

Mexico will step up security along its southern border with Guatemala to stop child migrants crossing on their way to the United States, the authorities said Friday.

The announcement comes after an increase in flows of undocumented migrants heading north following US President Joe Biden’s immigration reforms.

The operations on the southern border are aimed at protecting child migrants who are “exploited by criminal networks,” the National Migration Institute (NMI) said.

Patrols will use drones and night vision equipment for surveillance in areas where undocumented migrants are known to cross the border, it said.

Since January more than 4,000 Central American minors have been identified who “traveled irregularly in Mexican territory,” according to the NMI.

People traffickers are telling migrants to bring children to make it easier to enter Mexico and the United States, it said.

According to social workers in Mexico’s northeastern city of Matamoros, children are brought by parents or relatives to the border and sent over the border alone.

Once across, they are handed over to the Department of Health and Human Services, which helps them connect with family contacts inside the United States.

Mothers with small children are also sometimes allowed to stay, while undocumented adults crossing over alone are swiftly deported.

Facing growing political pressure, Biden this week urged migrants not to come.

Mexico’s southern border has been patrolled since 2019 by the National Guard to stop migrant caravans crossing over.

On Thursday Mexico announced restrictions on non-essential land traffic at the frontier with Guatemala that it said were aimed at curbing the spread of Covid-19.

The move coincided with a pledge by the United States to send AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccines to Mexico to help alleviate a shortage of doses.

Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said…

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