Rescuing Tara Read online

  'I was on pins and needles, waiting for news,' she told me.

  Lang called Dawn Ego again at 11:15 p.m. on the night of the rescue.

  'She's been rescued, she's safe and he's been arrested,' he told her exultantly.

  'It was just awesome when I heard,' Dawn said to me. 'But it was really a team effort. My sarge wants to be certain that you include in your story all the hard work done by everyone.'

  Special Agent Michael L. Yoder of the FBI stated the following in his affidavit recounting the events of that night:

  On June 16, 2008, agents with the FBI went to the residence of John Huskey. Huskey was placed under arrest and read his Miranda Rights and agreed to waive his rights and answer questions. Huskey also gave consent to search his residence. Huskey admitted to sexually molesting a 9 year old child, [known as Tara], since she was approximately 6 years old and posting images and videos of her sexual molestation on the internet. Huskey stated that he had several thousand images of 'Tara's' molestation and several hundred videos of sexual molestation on an external hard drive connected to his desktop computer. A view of the interior of the house indicated several matches to the background interior images found on the 'Tara' series images. Huskey admitted that a red digital camera, found in his bedroom, was used to record the sexual abuse of the child.

  Pursuant to the consent of Huskey, various computer media were seized.

  On June 17, 2008, 9-year-old 'Tara' was interviewed. She disclosed that Huskey had been sexually abusing her since she was five years old, and had anally raped her within the last day. She described that he recorded her abuse using a red digital camera.

  Huskey appeared in federal court in Atlanta the day after his arrest. He admitted to the assaults, threats, and to posting the online videos, referred to as the 'Tara Series'. According to court records, Huskey admitted sexually abusing the girl and distributing images of the abuse. To clinch the matter, the girl had told police she had been abused as recently as the night before.

  In a written release United States Attorney, David E Nahmias, said 'This defendant allegedly produced a notorious series of images of child sexual abuse that have circulated around the world, with demand from the most hard-core and despicable child-porn consumers'.

  Sergeant Glenn Lang told the media, 'This case is an example of inspired police work with a healthy dose of good luck, and it has everyone in the unit feeling euphoric.

  'We rarely get to actually participate in saving a child,' he said. 'It kind of beats you down a little when you always know you're on the losing side of things, never able to actually help the child themself, just stop the material from circulating. It's so exhilarating to get on the front end of it. It's probably the best feeling in the world.'

  Lang said the case showed the value of hard work and good fortune, rather than some sophisticated CSI technique.

  'I personally feel the magic is in deciding what is worth going after and what is not,' he said. 'If you pick the wrong item you really end up chasing your tail for a long time. If you pick the right item, all of the sudden things start resolving very quickly.'

  Dawn Ego told me, 'I want to commend all the people in the process that we spoke to. Not only law enforcement but just the general day-to-day people. They really went out of their way. They got motivated. They placed telephone calls independently without us even asking them. They really went out of their way to try to save this young girl. Also, in terms of the company identifying the fabric, they really know their stuff and they did everything they could to help this little girl.'

  The warm feeling about saving this particular little girl was an international experience shared by who all contributed to the investigation; including members of Task Force Argos in Brisbane, US state police - in particular the Maine State Police Computer Crimes Unit - the US Attorney General's Office in Bangor, the US Department of Education, various state police intelligence divisions, and the FBI.

  'We see thousands of kids and we have no hope of identifying most of them,' Superintendent Crawford told me. 'But this one was a good result.'

  At the headquarters of his Brisbane police unit, the arrest of Huskey and the rescue of 'Tara' was received with a mixture of jubilation, pride and great relief. The beer then flowed.

  'We were ecstatic,' Crawford said. 'A result like this keeps people motivated and lets us all know that the work we do here, from Australia, can benefit other kids around the world. It's a distasteful job and all of us have the best interests of the kids at heart, and some of these cases are going to really get at you. Tara was one of those cases.'

  Detective Superintendent Peter Crawford was awarded the Australian Police medal for his work on this investigation. The reward for his team was the capture of Tara's oppressor. Tara's misery had prevented any early feeling of hope while the search itself was on.

  'It required us, and later the FBI, to go through all of the images and carefully, methodically look for clues,' Crawford said.

  One can only imagine how the images would be seared in investigators' minds.

  Following Huskey's arrest the community became aware that the man accused of such a heinous crime had been working in the LaFayette area for several years as a private tennis instructor. He'd coached countless children and young people, holding the sessions on courts rented from the state recreation department's tennis courts. Huskey was not an employee of either the recreation department or the city of LaFayette, but offered his courses privately.

  The blogging on the internet increased. Along with disbelief and disgust that a man known to many could have had such a dark and secret side, came the fears that perhaps he'd assaulted other children—his tennis pupils. Police widened their investigations.

  In Rome, Georgia, on 25 November 2008, James Bartholomew 'Bart' Huskey pleaded guilty in the US federal district court to producing, distributing, and receiving child pornography. He admitted to 'sexually abusing a very young girl [his own daughter] in vile ways, filming the horrific abuse and then sending it out over the Internet for others with such repulsive interests to watch.'

  A full forensic review of Huskey's computer revealed many hundreds of images of child pornography, including many graphic photos and videos of 'Tara'. A search of Huskey's home also revealed many of the items that had been seen in his international trade in pornographic child abuse.

  Tara is presently undergoing counselling and other therapeutic assistance, in the hope that some of the incalculable and probably permanent damage to this little girl might be ameliorated in some way.

  US Attorney David E. Nahmias said of Huskey's admissions, 'This guilty plea is a tribute to the dedication and hard work of countless investigators from many agencies and many countries. If it weren't for their long hours and innovative investigative techniques, this defendant might still be abusing his defenceless victim and recording and distributing [the] images.'

  Huskey received a total of 70 years in prison and a lifetime of supervised release. At the sentencing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Francey Hakes displayed a graphic map, covered in hundreds of red dots, which showed the locations where authorities have confiscated videos and images from the "Tara" series since Huskey's arrest in June 2008.

  'The Tara series will be distributed throughout the world for many years to come unfortunately,' Hakes said. 'This case ranks right up there with the worst I've seen in 12 and a half years.'

  In sentencing Huskey, US Court Judge Robert L. Vining acknowledged that the sentence of one 30 year penalty along with two 20 year sentences, to be served sequentially, 'in effect appears to be a life sentence', but he also stated that 'the public needs to be protected from Mr Huskey'.

  At an appeal hearing in June 2009, Huskey's lawyer, W. Matthew Dodge, asked the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to allow the three sentences to run concurrently - effectively reducing the sentence to 30 years.

  In that appeal, Mr Dodge said the sentence was realistically a life sentence and said that Huskey would be more than 10
0 years old, when released, if he survived the sentence. Dodge argued that a reduction to serving the three sentences concurrently would be more in line with what the legislature intended when outlining criminal penalties for child pornography cases.

  'Mr. Huskey's crimes against Tara are inexcusable,' Dodge said. 'He has fed the unending appetite of the child pornography marketplace by sending these images out into the world. Mr. Huskey must be punished with a steep prison sentence.' In spite of this apparent recognition of his client's despicable behaviour, Dodge argued that the court had based the sentence heavily on the actual abuse, which is state jurisdiction, rather than on the manufacturing and distribution of the child pornography.

  'In the end, the federal statutes require that a district court sentence Mr. Huskey not for abusing (the victim) but for turning on the camera before he did so,' said Dodge.

  Federal prosecutors disagreed and said the sentence was justified and reflected the 'immense and inexplicable' suffering of the victim.

  The appellate court was not interested in reducing Huskey's sentence on a technicality. His sentence of 70 years was upheld.

  The ongoing work of Task Force Argos and its Operation Achilles has identified more than 2500 'customers' of child sex websites. One hundred of these, including a US reserve police officer and an Australian federal bureaucrat, have been arrested and charged.

  The task force members all take renewed heart from the fact that 70 children worldwide, including a four-year-old Brisbane girl, have been rescued since Tara.

  Footnote

  In February 2006, the US Attorney General launched Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative designed to protect children from online exploitation and abuse. For more information wherever you may be in the world, please visit: www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

  Internet pornography recognises no boundaries.

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  National Library of Australia Cataloguing-In-Publication data:

  Bowles, Robin

  Rescuing Tara

  ISBN 978-0-9875539-4-2

  Cover Design © Rae Cooper