Scourge – A Journey into Pedophile Society, Pt.3

Part 3 of Scourge – A Journey into Pedophile Society examines what we located on the suspect’s phone and some unexpected help from, of all places, New Zealand.

Once I handled that emotionally charged conversation informing his wife he was a pedophile, I seized the suspect’s phone and placed it into our secure evidence storage. He wouldn’t give me consent to search it, so I seized it as evidence and my new friend caught a ride with a patrol Deputy to be transported and booked into our jail where he could make lots of new friends with some of the same proclivities. Now I had to draft a search warrant for the cell phone and submit it to the District Attorney’s Office, then sit and wait for it to be reviewed and signed by a judge.

As I was working on reports, I realized I’d forgotten to ask him for the passcode to his phone. Without it, my forensic software wouldn’t be able to conduct the examination. I hadn’ t yet received the search warrant and but I called over to the jail. I informed my suspect I was obtaining said search warrant and I needed his passcode so I could use the forensic software in the confines of my office. The alternative was to send the phone to the criminalistics laboratory and wait a decade for them to examine it (that’s obviously an exaggeration… but not by much.) The crime lab has the ability to bypass a locked cell phone in order to conduct a forensic examination, but it generally takes a long time. Initially, he stated he wanted to speak to his attorney before making the decision on whether to give me the code. I advised him he was under no obligation to give me the passcode, however, I needed to make a decision that day on what to do with his cell phone. I told him if he wanted to wait to speak to his attorney, he absolutely could but I may as well just send the phone to the laboratory. I thanked him for his time (as if he was super busy sitting in jail) and prepared to hang up and start the laboratory submission sheet. He stopped me and stated he’d rather give me the passcode then have the phone sent to the laboratory. He didn’t want the lab to hold on to his phone forever, as it was his work phone (Yes, he used his work phone to download all the child porn…Brilliant, right?) and he was under some illusion he’d be able to get it back so his employer wouldn’t be upset. Wrong. But, I humored him and happily jotted down the passcode.

Now, I’d like to take a brief interlude to explain some case law surrounding cell phone passcodes. I won’t bore you with legalese but, essentially, the passcode to your phone is not considered protected by the 4th Amendment. That is, even if you state you’d like to invoke your 5th Amendment right to remain silent and you state you’d like to speak to an attorney, I can still ask you for your passcode without violating your Miranda Rights because the passcode is considered “administrative”. Your Miranda Rights protect you from answering questions which would incriminate you while you’re in custody. Asking for your passcode is not incriminating, in and of itself. So, although I did not yet have my search warrant and my pedophile had stated he’d like to speak to his attorney first, I violated no rights or case law by obtaining the passcode. I need a search warrant to SEARCH your phone, not obtain the administrative information I’d need to execute the search warrant once I have it. The passcode is not evidentiary. The information I access WITH the passcode is evidentiary. And, the reality is, I’d get into the phone and obtain the evidence with or without the passcode by sending it to the laboratory. So, obtaining the passcode was simply saving everyone time and effort. Now, if I were to use the fact that you knew the passcode of the phone to try and prove the phone belonged to you (which was not the case here), THEN asking for the passcode would technically be evidentiary since I planned to use it as evidence of ownership. Make sense? No? Ok, think of it like this:

Hypothetically speaking, I’m going to get a search warrant for your house. The key to your front door is like the passcode. I don’t have the search warrant yet, but I tell you it’s coming and I’d like the key to your house so we can execute the search warrant when it comes in. You tell me you’d like to talk to your attorney first. Now, I don’t NEED the key to your house to get in. We can just breach the door with a battering ram and make entry. However, it’s easier for everyone if I use the key. You don’t have to give me the key. After all, you do have the right to remain silent and not provide me with any information or help at all. But once I have the search warrant, I’ll get in one way or another. Also, I’m not searching your house by asking you for the key. As a matter of fact, even if you give me the key, I’ll still wait until I have the search warrant in hand before I even put it in the door. Asking for the key is simply a matter of convenience and an administrative function. The key itself is not evidentiary nor is asking for it an attempt to obtain an evidentiary statement of any kind. Which means, even if you invoke your 5th amendment right to remain silent, barring me from asking you any questions in which the answers could incriminate you, I can still ask you for the key without violating your rights. And as long as I wait until I have the search warrant to use the key and look inside your house, I’ve crossed no legal boundaries.

Easy peasy, right? Well, remember this little conversation. It creates massive problems later and shines a light on how broken the system is when it comes to holding pedophiles accountable for ruining the lives of children… If said pedophile has enough money, that is.

The warrant came through within hours and I immediately hooked his cell phone up to my forensic software. It downloaded the contents of the phone and I reviewed them over the course of the next day. I realized this was his work phone and it actually belonged to the large technology company he worked for. It appeared he used his work phone for his elicit pedophile activities because his wife had access to his personal phone.

What I located on his phone was, for most normal human beings, probably shocking and sickening. But for me, it was just another Wednesday. Within the icons of his phone, I noticed the familiar “M” logo for an app called MegaNZ. Anyone familiar with this cloud-based date storage application knows any data you store is typically end-to-end encrypted which prevents even anyone working at MegaNZ from seeing what you’re storing on their platform. It’s also protected from law enforcement because MegaNZ operates out of New Zealand, a country that has such a great relationship with the United States it refuses to honor or search warrants or subpoenas.

Now, I knew exactly what I’d find on this application IF I was able to access it. MegaNZ is notorious for hosting large amounts of child pornography because they have plausible deniability (“We can’t even see what people are storing. It’s encrypted” – MegaNZ… Probably) and they simply deny any subpoena or search warrant sent to them on jurisdictional grounds. A pedophile would know this, too. Also, when you click the MegaNZ application, you need a completely separate password to access the data stored within. Which meant I was probably beat. There’s no way the suspect would give up that password and MegaNZ wouldn’t be of any help.

I clicked on the application anyway, more out of habit that any actual hope it would miraculously open. The phone stalled out for a minute, then the MegaNZ logo filled the screen. I glanced away at my office clock then looked back at the application, expecting to see a login scree and preparing for disappointment. I had to do a double take. It opened. He had disabled the log in screen. What kind of a moron uses a securely encrypted application but leaves it logged in at all time!? An impatient, horny moron who gets tired of typing in his username and password just to view his child porn. Which is exactly what I saw when the app opened. My stomach turned slightly at the content. It wasn’t just child porn. We’re not talking pictures of 16-year-old girl’s breasts. This was toddler porn. Grown ass men having sexual intercourse with prepubescent toddlers and kids between the ages of 4-8 years old. And he was sharing it with others on the internet. A whole pedophile community.

Now, for those of you unfamiliar with child porn, and I hope that’s all of you (if not, I’ll see you soon), this genre of child porn is so egregious and revolting the courts have determined the sharing of it to be an off-grid felony. At least in my state. Meaning there is no penalty range or maximum. This is punishable by up to life in prison based on circumstances. Given the fact Mr. Nature Center Pedophile had attempted to meet who he thought was a 14-year-old girl for sex, I figured the sharing of this material would certainly be looked at as an egregious enough offense to warrant a serious penalty. Unfortunately, I underestimated the criminal justice system’s ability to royally screw society.

Check back in next week for Part 4, where we’ll discuss how the case gets turned on its head and our pedophile learns his fate!