Child pornography network dismantled in France and Germany, nineteen suspects arrested

Nineteen people suspected of belonging to a child pornography network were arrested, including fourteen in France and five in Germany, the police and prosecutors of the two countries announced on Wednesday April 24.

French gendarmerie arrested twelve Germans and two Americans, aged 36 to 74, who were gathered in Thann, Alsace, and searched their hotel rooms and vehicles. They were placed in police custody for forty-eight hours. At the same time, five other suspects were arrested in Germany at their home, according to both French and German press releases. Searches took place at their homes and, in two cases, at their workplace.

“The Franco-German legal operation led to the discovery of several multimedia supports as well as numerous other material evidence”write the gendarmerie and the French public prosecutor’s office. “After an initial use of mobile phones, digital tablets and [des] laptops, the presence of photos and videos of a child pornography nature could be noted, allowing suspicions to be confirmed”they add.

“Partial confessions”

According to the joint statement from the police and the public prosecutor’s office in Hanover, Germany, in charge of the investigation, “some suspects made partial confessions and accused each other”. The investigation continues, with the aim of identifying potential victims and finding other members of the network in order to remove them from their digital anonymity and prosecute them.

The investigations which led to this double dragnet began in December 2023. German police had started an investigation concerning people from Lower Saxony, the regional state of which Hanover is the capital, in the north of the country.

Two men were arrested there in February and April. “According to the first results of the investigation, there are links between these two men and certain people who were taken into police custody this week”, writes the Hanover public prosecutor’s office. He nevertheless specifies that the two individuals are not part of the network.