An online ad offered raunchy sex with an underage teen girl.
In reality, the operation was an elaborate sting that at one point was swamped with more than 100 calls a day from Johns in the GTA seeking to feed their most demented desires.
There were an eye-popping 1,100 queries across the province for sex with the non-existent teen, in reality, an undercover cop.
Peel Regional Police’s head of the human trafficking section, Det. Sgt. Bob Hackenbrook, told the Toronto Sun that human trafficking detectives were surprised by the volume of interest that the bogus ad garnered.
“We were busy,” Hackenbrook said.
While 35 were arrested and charged by Peel cops, it is the high level of interest in sex with children that is most chilling. Across Ontario, there were 85 arrests and 165 charges laid.
“It was a very difficult case, but there were great partnerships with other police services,” Hackenbrook added.
Those charged included a teacher, students, business owners, construction workers, entrepreneurs, and retirees. One of those arrested had two outstanding warrants for his arrest in Guelph for breaching his release order.
The sting was part of Project Juno and comprised human trafficking teams working undercover operations across the province. The goal was to target Johns who were attempting to have sex with children.
Cops say the sting was the result of a “positive Supreme Court of Canada ruling R. vs Ramelson from York Regional Police Project called Raphael.”
The ruling created a “step-by-step approach for officers and the Crown in the prosecution of these proactive investigations. Our project, called Project Juno, is a proactive approach to identifying and arresting Johns who seek to pay for sex from youths,” Peel Regional Police said in a release.
torontosun.com
