Stock image of a computer
(Picture: PA)Working from home was behind a dramatic surge in arrests for possessing “horrific” child abuse images, police warned on Friday.
Scotland Yard revealed suspects are getting younger, having had their structure disrupted by not returning to offices and spending more time online.
In a series of raids across London last week, detectives held 24 people and helped shield 127 children from harm.
During the lockdowns, arrests made by a specialist unit targeting predators soared by 53 per cent from 240 in 2019 to 367 in 2020. There were another 224 last year and 40 since January.
The Met’s child sexual abuse and exploitation unit receives referrals every day from the National Crime Agency working closely with its US counterparts.
Most prosecuted are males aged between 30 and 40 sharing images across social media platforms.
Detective superintendent Helen Flanagan told the Standard: “It’s not your typical ‘dirty old men’. These perpetrators are getting younger and younger.
“We’re seeing people in their late teens and early twenties who have a propensity to view indecent images of children.
“Others are attractive people, well-heeled, with great careers — and intelligent. It’s quite a complex area. But there are a couple of themes that have come through as a result of Covid where people are working from home with greater online access.
“Probably structure — in terms of not travelling to work and then coming home. The routines have changed.
“People who would be into mainstream pornography, they’ve blended into pushing their boundaries sexually, and that’s where we’ve seen people moving into viewing child sex abuse.
“It doesn’t make it any more palatable — each of those images is a child who has been raped or sexually assaulted. Every picture or video is a crime scene.
“Customers are driving the volume for people to produce this imagery.”
Her colleague Jo Lloyd added that many suspects have wives who are so devastated they need to be provided with support by charity partners the Lucy Faithfull Foundation.
She added: “When we go through the door, we’re mindful it will turn someone’s life upside down. There are a lot of other victims in this — partners, children, family members and friends.”
Since being set up in 2016, the unit has found 150,000 category A photos and videos of the most serious child abuse, 185,000 category B files and 4.6 million in category C. The team painstakingly views and grades each image.
One suspect’s device held three terabytes of data alone, equivalent to 3,000 hours of video and 930,000 pictures. Officers likened the task to “looking for a needle in a haystack of needles”.
Ms Flanagan spoke of her frustration that when many offenders appear in court for viewing images or grooming children for sex they receive suspended sentences and a prevention order.
She said: “My concern is that it is now seen as a volume crime. I’m not suggesting we should imprison everyone, but the sentencing is really poor and it’s getting poorer. We see a majority —because they will be first-time offenders — receiving suspended sentences.
“It’s not reflecting the risk that is happening.”
