Implementing Laws to Save Children

Convicted pedophiles in Australia on the National Child Offenders Register will be forbidden to travel abroad. Their passports will be cancelled, according to new proposed laws.   Thousands of would-be child victims will be saved from horrific sexual abuse by this promised legislation. This is a breakthrough commitment by the Australian government and a great example for other legislators around the world to follow with similar laws. 

This, according to the Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, will be the effect of new legislation to be introduced next month. It is a “world first,” according to the minister and it certainly is a wake up call and challenge to many more governments to introduce similar laws to stop child sex tourism that is rampant and on-going especially in Southeast Asia including the Philippines. 

Minister Bishop said, “Last year alone, almost 800 registered child sex offenders travelled overseas from Australia.”

Many of the convicted pedophiles have traveled without notifying the authorities as they are bound to and many have a high-risk of re-offending and sexually abusing children when abroad. Pedophilia is a condition without cure according to some authorities. 

Child sexual offenders are many in Australia and as many as 20,000 people who have been convicted and have been released from jail are on the register. Those policing the National Child Offender Register continue to monitor them. They are likely to travel abroad and endanger children. The minister also said that every year another 2,500 will be added to the list. Denying them passport will protect children abroad. 

Another positive development in the legal sphere is that the Philippine congress declined to lower the minimum age of criminally liability of children from 15 years-of-age to nine years. This is a big victory for reason and compassion and understanding. It has been the result of continuous publicity, much political lobbying, presentations of the reality of the psychological make-up of children to the legislators and international diplomatic pressure. 

This is one of the laws that President Rodrigo Duterte wanted enacted. He said the children had “criminal minds” and had to be punished. Known as “The Punisher” when he ruled Davao City as mayor, the president is now well-known for his harsh and iron-fisted crack down on those suspected of wrongdoing especially drug users and sellers. According to some media people keeping count, as many as 8000 suspects have been killed to date.

To stop or at least greatly reduce the horrible crime against children who are being sexually abused in front of live Internet connected cameras for paying customers in foreign countries, the Philippine law (RA 9775) has to be implemented. The corruption surrounding the non-implementation of this law is staggering and morally an outrage.   

International bodies, agencies, individuals and governments have to use all the diplomatic know-how to pressure the Philippine government to implement the 2009 anti-child pornography and anti-cyber sex laws. Internet petitions, email letters, lobbying at Philippine embassies around the world will bring the international voice of the concerned to the attention of the Philippine government. If government were to impose a ban on telecommunication parts to the Philippine companies, that would make them think of the evil they are allowing to happen through the unfiltered wide-open Internet Server Providers. Allowing the child pornography to be passing through and stored in your servers is like allowing toxic chemical to be stored in your  living room.  

The crime of child abuse has a life-lasting impact on the victim of pain and degradation. For a child to be raped on live webcam over the Internet is a horrific and heinous crime. Those who allow it and are mandated to block it must be held guilty of child abuse by omission. There are thousands of victims. 

It is such an easy, quick, and lucrative source of money that relatives and parents are doing it with the help of criminals in cyber-sex dens. But the bigger criminals in government and in the Philippines telecommunications industry are those that do not stop it when they can. 

RA 9775 was passed in 2009 explicitly ordering the ISP companies to install software to block the transmission of child porn images and live cyber-sex acts. This is where children are raped live on the Internet or forced to do sexual acts live on camera sent through the Internet to paying customers in other cities or countries. But the authorities and executives of the telecommunications companies have allegedly ignored it. They seemingly have persuaded law enforcement to look the other way and allow them to pay a "fine." This could be the greatest act of corruption ever.  Stealing money is one thing but stealing the lives of little children is far worse and surely beyond forgiveness.  

It is alleged too that some officials of the government telecommunications commission and law enforcement agencies have been allegedly “captured” or “bought off,” so they will not enforce the law. Former employees of the telecommunications companies are members of the government bodies supposed to enforce the law.  The critics of these big phone and Internet companies accuse them of making money out of the dirty business of child abuse. They have not been investigated, charged or found guilty of any crime. This is amazing since the law was passed in 2009. It is time the anti-child-pornography NGOs  took a lead role in taking legal action against the national telecommunications commission and  their  cronies in the telecommunications companies.   

We can all be advocates for child rights from the keyboard of our computer. Share this article with as many as you know and copy it to the government agencies and embassies. At least they will know the crimes that they allow to happen daily against children. More articles to share are  available on www.preda.org . Let’s act and strike back for children.

Cybersex, Crime of the Century

The photograph in itself is a kind of pornography of the wealthiest oligarchs, tycoons, money-magnets, business moguls, elite Industrialists, rogue capitalists, barons of industry and financial tyrants and heads of corporate conglomerates some ethical business people, call them what you will but words fail me. They are among the estimated some 0.0001 percent of the Philippine mega-rich that own and control the entire economy of 103 Million Filipinos.

The Philippines has 21 billionaires, according to Forbes Magazine, with a record number this year. The richest - retail and property mogul Henry Sy - has a net worth of US$13.7 billion (S$19.6 billion). They take their place among the world’s richest people, eight of whom, according to an Oxfam report, own more wealth than half the people in the world.

The Philippine tycoons stood with President Rodrigo Duterte for the photograph in the Presidential Palace last Tuesday 17 January 2017 to capture the moment for posterity. They joyfully feasted and talked business for three hours over a sumptuous meal that would have fed 200 people for a week. These are the very people that the president vowed to bring down. He may be fattening them up for the kill.

"The only way for deliverance of this country is to remove it from clutches of the few people who hold the power and money," Duterte said last 23 November 2016. The president had previously warned the telecoms corporations such as Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co and Globe Telecom to change their monopolistic ways. They are the leading Internet Server Providers (ISPs) and are allegedly in violation of the Anti-Child Pornography Law of 2009 for failing to block child pornography on their servers.

Last August 2, 2016 President Rodrigo Duterte promised he would destroy the Philippine "oligarchs.” On another occasion, he said he would destroy the corrupt business tycoons and moguls. "I am fighting a monster... Believe me, I will destroy their clutches in our nation," Duterte said at an environment summit in southern Davao City last year.

Now to the relief of the business elite, moguls and tycoons, a more compassionate, understanding, forgiving and business-friendly President has emerged during the night of feasting to welcome the “monsters” into his dining hall. Hopefully he warned them to share their vast wealth and invest in the poorer regions of the Philippines and to pay just wages.

The poor are so poor some trade in small amounts of drugs but the drug barons benefit and are untouchable. Other poor people sell their children to the cybersex operators connected to the internet through the PLDT, Sun, Smart and Globe internet servers. These criminals send live images of children being sexually abused to foreign customers around the world and collect payment at Western Union and other money transfer stations.  

Child pornography and cyber-sex involving minors is a heinous crime against the person and dignity of the child. The Philippines is becoming a leading source of these illegal images and children are being abused in the making and distribution of them. The child porn images are spread around the world through the Internet and the ISPs in every country that do not have filters and blocking technology are aiding and abetting these crimes against children.

If President Duterte is true to his word to challenge and bring the tycoons of the Philippine ruling elite to develop the country, he could start with Manny V. Pangilinan, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO of PLDT, Suncellular and Smart. He and his company is bound by law to filter and block every pornography web site that carries child pornography. The 2009 Anti-child Porn Law is very clear and explicit. The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) in 2014, through Memorandum Circular No. 01-01-2014, ordered ISPs to “install available technology, program or software that will block access or filter all websites carrying child pornography materials” within 120 days from the submission of a list of these solutions to the Inter-Agency Council Against Child Pornography (IACACP).

They have not complied. It has been announced in the media last week that only three pornography websites containing child images are now blocked. This is an insult to the law, the government National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) and Secretary of the Cabinet Leoncio (Jun) Evasco, representative of President Duterte, and to whom the commissioners must report.  There are hundreds of child pornography websites in cyberspace. The Philippine ISPs must by law install total blocking software. But they defy the law and refuse to do it in the interests of profit-making and expanding their vast wealth at the expense of the abused children.      

In the Philippines the telephone companies are violating the law by not having these filters in place as demanded by the Anti-Child Pornography Act of 2009 otherwise known as RA 9775. They have seemingly placed themselves above it and seem to have some government officials in their pockets. In addition to the Anti-child Pornography Law, they are also allegedly violating with impunity the Public Telecommunications Policy Act of 1995 or RA 7925 and Executive Order No. 546 issued in 1979.  The tycoons are now dining with the President hoping that he will overlook their crimes of ignoring the law and exploitation and aiding and abetting the abuse of vulnerable children. The president and cabinet secretary Jun Evasco will surely hold them to account and protect the Filipino children from this horrific heinous cybercrime of child sexual abuse.

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth. 

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth. 

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth. 

The Good News is That Justice Has Been Done

The serial child sexual abuser Douglas Slade from Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire was sentenced to 24 years in jail after he was extradited back to the UK and faced sexual abuse charges.

He was charged in court in Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines several times for abuse of children in his luxurious child sex den but was able to bribe his way out of all the charges allegedly with the help of corrupt police, court officials and bent lawyers. Slade admitted in an interview with a UK television channel that he paid lawyers to “fix” the cases.

Preda Foundation social workers and paralegal officers assisted the victims and are legal guardians for some of them with power of attorney. Slade has abused as many as 33 children living within half a kilometer of his house, which he built next to an elementary school and had a gate leading to the playground. He allegedly gave gifts to the school principal to allow the boys to come in his house where he abused them.

The Preda Foundation is working to file civil action cases in the UK against Slade to demand compensation for the degrading and human suffering and psychological damage that the children endure.

One boy reported, as reported by Simon Perry in his report in the Mail Online, that Slade threatened him and other victims with a gun if they or their parents told the police about the sexual abuse. Slade kept a firearm in his house. According to the report, Slade had video cameras fitted to the wall in both the living room and the bedroom. He would film his abuse and told Christian and the other boys he was selling the footage to friends over the Internet. “Mr. Douglas told us to do things to him and he told us we had to do it right as he told us to because it was all going on video,' he said.

When Slade’s computer broke down, he called in a technician to repair it. This technician saw the pictures of sexual abuse, knew it was indicative of a crime and reported it to police. He made copies so the police would have evidence to get a search warrant. The police raided the home with a search warrant and got the original material in a legal manner. However, in the Angeles City Court, Slade’s lawyers were able to say that the original procurement of the video were illegal and despite the evidence that the police got the same evidence legally, the case was dismissed despite the powerful evidence of the child rape themselves.

It was at this stage that the Preda director in conversation with visiting UK child protection officials brought the case of Slade to their attention. Soon, historic cases in the UK were revived with their help and the help of media and Slade was extradited.

The role of the Internet in distributing the images of child sexual abuse is vast. The Internet is an electronic digital communications tool that can be used for good or bad. The pedophiles and child abusers have got a powerful tool at their disposal to make and distribute the most horrific videos and images of child sexual assault.

That’s why making and distributing child porn is so dangerous and evil. Even children can have access to this dehumanizing and personality destructive material by accident. It can be sent to them by pedophiles grooming them to accept this as a “normal” form of human interaction. Sometimes, it works and the child is seduced. Others are psychologically affected in a negative way. When they view these images they have a negative view of adults as dangerous, threatening and abusive. It can destroy their trust in adults and their own parents and they become disturbed and rebellious. The world appears to them to be out to hurt and exploit them.

Parents must learn the dangers of unlimited access by children to the Internet and must protect their children against this digital poison in cyber space as they would protect them against a bottle of weed killer in the garden shed.

In most countries, it is a crime to access, download, view or possess child pornography. In the Philippines, the 2009 anti-child pornography law is strict and revolutionary in that it orders the internet server providers (ISPs) to filter and block child pornography passing to customers through their servers. Preda Foundation lobbied, advised and helped bring that provision to the law.

However Philippine government officials under past administrations have never insisted that the internet server providers (ISPs), mostly foreign-owned, follow and implement the law. They fear they will lose top paying customers and millions in profits.

Poverty is not the prime cause of child sexual abuse. It is the criminal behavior coming mostly from depraved and evil men who desire sex with children. Children especially hungry children are vulnerable to being lured and abused. Child sexual abuse and pornography thrives in a culture of cover-up and non-reporting of child abuse. This is what must change. We can prevent abuse and protect children by speaking the truth.