Transnational Child Sexual Abuse: Outcomes from a Roundtable Discussion
Abstract
:1. Introduction
1.1. Offender Characteristics
1.2. Types of Networks
1.3. The Role of Cyberspace as an Enabler and Mode of Child Sexual Exploitation
1.4. National and International Policy—Current Response Frameworks
2. Method
2.1. Study Design
2.2. Participants/Discussants
2.3. Procedure and Materials
2.4. Data Analysis
3. Results
3.1. Roundtable Discussion
3.1.1. TCSA Definition
“I think there’s a more fundamental question to be asked—what do we mean by location and distribution channels? What is being distributed via what channel? (…) It can be online or offline, it can be abroad, or being streamed.”“There’s a burning question about motivation there, isn’t there? Because there will be people that will have a sort of prima facie motivation to go to a different country or location—regardless of whether its online/offline—to abuse a child. And so will therefore proactively seek out information that will allow them to do this. But then (…) you have situational offenders who may just be, for example, engaging with CSEM [Child Sexual Exploitation Material] in a network (…) where there’s some on-going conversations, and then all of a sudden, the opportunity presented itself.”
“[We need to consider] economic discrepancies or poverty in the countries where this happens and the cultural acceptability of the exploitation happening. It’s not just a question of demand—but children coming round hotels offering services … so that parameter of wealth, poverty and social inequality in these locations seemed to be a key factor in our discussions.”
3.1.2. Criminal Justice Issues
Management of Travelling Offenders
“If we’re concerned about UK offenders travelling abroad, there’s places like Kenya, Philippines, and older countries like Thailand and Cambodia that continue to be areas of concern.”
Investigative Methods
“One of the issues we raised was prevention. In the UK, we haven’t got a bottomless pit of resources of money. Let’s deal with our offenders going abroad and deal with them at source. They may be men, and they may be coming from here, but let’s deal with our own offenders first and see what works, and then spread that. Deal with the root cause.”
Enhancing Knowledge about the Offending
“We were recognising that CSEM is all over, but why do people travel to do it? There are various hypotheses—high-risk sex offenders who carefully monitor might choose to do that. Respected individuals who might not do it in this country would go abroad—a process of normalisation might reinforce that. We were looking at could we understand the pathways by which people ended up doing that. Part of that would be what would come out of investigations leading to convictions, but part of it might come from interviewing people about how their pathways developed. It could be that it’s through sharing exploitative material, networking—building up to it from that. Or it might be that there’s knowledge of certain places to go to—how do people get that knowledge? From an intervention viewpoint, those processes might have points that could be disrupted.”
Maintaining a Victim-Centric Stance
“It is very difficult when you’ve got different levels of victim support and training—what exactly are we looking to prevent? Because a lot of these problems on the ground are not exactly preventable.”
3.1.3. Geographical Issues
“We were saying corruption is a real problem—it leads on from poverty. The reverse is: the offenders are rich, they can buy people off. They can buy the family off, they can groom the family. They can pay police officers off. Families will take any amount of money for a child. So poverty, corruption and richness together is the perfect triangle of abuse, isn’t it?”
“Maybe it’s not just people travelling abroad … maybe they are more sexualised here? Is this a cultural phenomenon? Is [TCSA] actually a specific issue or is it just sexual abuse in general happening in different fora with new technology?”“We had a presentation at a hotel recently, there was a person from serious crime office talking about CSE [child sexual exploitation]—1.3 million children were abused in this country [UK]. (…) Why don’t we talk about this country? We have 10,000 refugee children missing in Europe. It’s much easier to talk about what’s happening in Vietnam—it makes us feel more comfortable, but that’s the way it is.”
“It depends on the level of sophistication of the offender you see. The newbies will go in social media—which are controlled by the police. We’re talking now about the dark social (not necessarily dark web), but those that can’t be encrypted such as Snapchat, where there’s no potential of looking. So if I’m an offender and I start a network with others who bring other people, then I can organise my own network.”
3.1.4. Tourism/Hospitality Issues
3.2. Priority Ranking
4. Discussion
4.1. Key Theme 1: Offender Typologies
4.2. Key Theme 2: Victim-Centric Investigative Practice
4.3. Key Theme 3: Prevalence and Definitions
4.4. Key Theme 4: Collaboration
4.5. Limitations
5. Conclusions
Author Contributions
Funding
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Theme | Research Question | Priority Ranking |
---|---|---|
Offending Behaviour | How do offenders know to go to certain locations/distribution channels? | 7 |
Victim Safeguarding | What support is available to children/victims in affected countries (e.g., safe housing, psychological support, compensation)? | 6 |
Victim Safeguarding | In cases of compensation, how can we ensure there is no meta-abuse of the victim, and how can policy ensure such accountability? | 5 |
Victim Safeguarding | In some countries, victims of child sexual abuse may be seen as criminally liable (differences in legislation between countries); issue of victim blaming/stigma surrounding victimisation, and power | 5 |
Offending Behaviour | What types of transnational child sexual abuse exists? | 5 |
Offending Behaviour | What are the profiles of perpetrators in-country vs. foreign visitors (travelling sex offenders)? How do live-streaming offences fit in? | 5 |
Culturally-Sensitive Responding | Western way of thinking in a non-Western problem—how can we think/act globally? | 4 |
Offending Behaviour | What is the impact of online child sexual abuse, networking, and travelling on contact sex offending? | 4 |
Victim Safeguarding | Can you do research with the child victim? What are the consequences to the child? What are their perceptions of the help provided? | 3 |
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Merdian, H.L.; Perkins, D.E.; Webster, S.D.; McCashin, D. Transnational Child Sexual Abuse: Outcomes from a Roundtable Discussion. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2019, 16, 243. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16020243
Merdian HL, Perkins DE, Webster SD, McCashin D. Transnational Child Sexual Abuse: Outcomes from a Roundtable Discussion. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2019; 16(2):243. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16020243
Chicago/Turabian StyleMerdian, Hannah L., Derek E. Perkins, Stephen D. Webster, and Darragh McCashin. 2019. "Transnational Child Sexual Abuse: Outcomes from a Roundtable Discussion" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 16, no. 2: 243. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16020243