Naming and Shaming > A brother's tragic tale > Waging war against child porn

Det. Sgt. Paul Gillespie sits in his office in police headquarters in downtown Toronto and talks about what he does for a living as the guy in charge of the force's child exploitation unit.

He pulls up a video on his computer, one of four he says his unit seized in the previous two weeks.

"This is simply typical," he says. "Some have sound; some don't. This one we just got is very disturbing to the guys."

The images on the screen are difficult to look at and listen to. A man is raping a young child in a bathtub.

"Sometimes you see children just screaming, obviously very upset and disturbed," says Gillespie. "As often, though, we'll see children … They go into almost like a trance. I find that more disturbing - that a child having this happen would not be screaming, just accepting."

Last year alone, the Toronto police seized millions of images of child pornography - not all of them as bad as Gillespie's example.

But it is illegal in Canada to distribute a picture of someone under the age of 18 involved in any sexual activity.

Gillespie knows there is a broad range of images out there, ranging from torture to mere posing. But to him, child pornography is child pornography and it's a crime.

"These are crime scene photos," says Gillespie. "They are memorializations of the worst, most horrific moment in somebody's life, and people are going to trade around forever and take pleasure in.

"I don't know of anything could be more despicable."

That's why he has no qualms about naming people arrested for possession or distribution.

"Every time someone looks at one of these pictures, the child is revictimized," he says. "When I hear things in court like "Oh my guy … he was just collecting. He's just looking at this stuff, he's not the problem.'

"Well, you know - yeah, he is the problem. These aren't hockey cards - these are children being tortured."

A sudden reversal

On Sept. 23, 2003, about five months after James LeCraw was arrested, all charges against him were withdrawn.

No reasons were read into the record during his brief court appearance, but a spokesperson from the Ontario Attorney General's office said the prosecution was "discontinued on the basis of new evidentiary considerations" that affected the strength of the Crown's case.

So in the eyes of the law, James is innocent.

But there was no media conference to trumpet the news on that day - just a quick up-and-down appearance in a downtown courtroom.

James called his brother to let him know the news. "It was fantastic," remembers Bob LeCraw. "We got together a few days later, to have a beer, talk it over. He was still pretty upset. [But] now he was looking forward."

James then set out to get his old job back, armed with a letter from his lawyer.

"In criminal law, there is no greater exoneration than the withdrawal of a charge," reads the letter, addressed to John May, chair of the board for Computers for Schools. "In fact, the withdrawal of a charge is an even greater vindication than an acquittal. [It] is tantamount to the charge never having been laid."

But James's former employer wouldn't even consider taking him back unless he agreed to a separate investigation.

"We told him we felt we had to do an investigation to find out whether there is any truth in the claims that the police had made," says Mays. "We felt as a board that we had both a right to know whether those allegations were true and an obligation to our various stakeholders to ascertain whether they were true."

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