The horror of three Peruvian minors exploited by their brothers to produce child pornography | International

It all started with an alert received by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), an American NGO, last February: through a complaint made online, it was detected that in Lima a user —registered with a Gmail email and associated with two telephone numbers— distributed and marketed material with child sexual abuse content on various digital platforms. The case was referred to the Special Prosecutor for Trafficking in Persons of Lima, which since then has worked in conjunction with the Department of Child Cyber ​​Protection of the Division of Investigation of High Technology Crimes (DIVINDAT) of the Peruvian National Police and also with the United States Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).

The six months of follow-up resulted in a chilling picture: according to the investigations, a 6-year-old boy, a 10-year-old girl, and a 16-year-old adolescent were exploited by a group of adults, who recorded the abuse and spread it on WhatsApp groups. and Telegram in exchange for large sums of money. The detail is that everything indicated that the alleged attackers were direct relatives of the victims: their half-siblings.

The suspicions were confirmed on Wednesday of this week, in a mega-operation that has convulsed society. Security forces raided a humble home in the Lurín district, south of Lima. In the middle of a home in absolute disorder, which according to the investigation emanated an unpleasant odor, the agents rescued the three minors and arrested Johan José María Del Mar La Rosa and Jim Anthony Chumpitaz La Rosa, aged 20 and 31, respectively. Both are being investigated for alleged crimes of aggravated child pornography, to the detriment of minors. They will remain detained for a week, along with a third member, 36 years old, whose name has not been revealed, who was later arrested and whose cell phone was found with child pornography.

“The children have been completely abandoned. They haven't even gone to school," said one of the senior police officers. The mother of the victims has denied having any knowledge of the abuses that were committed in her home. She maintains that she never used to go home, because she had to look for them in the street, recycling plastics, cardboard and metals. There is no news of her father.

"We understand that one of the girls had already told her family, in May of this year, that she had suffered sexual violence, for which they already knew," Commander Jimmy Cáceres, of the Investigation Division, has denied it. Criminal (Dirincri). A fact that has dismayed the population even more is that the girl under 16 is pregnant. "It is presumed that her father would be one of the brothers," says Cáceres.

As explained by the prosecutor specializing in the crime of human trafficking, Evelyn Taboada, the brothers Del Mar La Rosa and Chumpitaz La Rosa published the pornographic material in closed groups with monthly subscriptions to users from different countries. Therefore, it is not ruled out that both are a link in an international pedophilia network. “These days, the prosecutor in charge of the investigation is collecting all the evidence that she has seized at the scene. It is not ruled out that more linked numbers, more accounts and more telephones can be found in it”, reported Rocío Gala, coordinator of the Specialized Prosecutors for Trafficking in Persons.

It is estimated that the photo packs could exceed one hundred dollars. “While the age of the victim goes up, the price goes down. If it is a child under four years of age, he is much more expensive, ”explains Colonel Luis Huamán, head of the DIVINDAT. One of the purposes of the agents is to recover evidence that has probably been deleted by the detainees on their cell phones and electronic devices.

Meanwhile, the three minors are receiving support from the Special Protection Unit (UPE), an agency of the Ministry for Women and Vulnerable Populations (MIMP), which is evaluating protection measures. Soon they could be transferred to a temporary shelter or also to a safe family environment. The main thing, for now, is to separate them from any situation that puts them in danger again.

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