UK police catch US abuse suspect

West Midlands officers tracked the American through chatrooms

Police in the West Midlands have helped rescue six boys from an alleged sexually abusive foster father in the United States.

West Midlands Police's paedophile unit found images of the six youngsters being assaulted, while investigating a British child abuser.

The unit examined sites used by the American, and informed the FBI.

The man was charged with 30 counts of child rape and other offences. The boys in his care were taken away.

Police say the 41-year-old from Washington State, had been using the same chatroom as Graham Kennedy, from Birmingham, England.

Kennedy was jailed for three-and-a-half years at Wolverhampton Crown court last month, after 73,000 indecent images of children were found on his computer.

We are having a significant impact on groups practising paedophile behaviour Detective Inspector Darren Brookes

Kennedy, a former primary school teacher, who was 30 at the time of his arrest, had posed as a 14-year-old online and indecently assaulted a boy of that age he met in a chatroom.

Detective Inspector Darren Brookes, head of the unit, said: "This kind of policing is vital in making the internet safer.

Groom victims

"When paedophiles go online now, they have to worry about whether the person they are talking to, who they think is a child or another paedophile, is actually a police officer.

"The concept that it is impossible to police the internet and that people can carry out their criminality with impunity is a misnomer.

"We can have, and are having, a significant impact on groups practising such criminality and paedophile behaviour."

The unit seeks out paedophiles by going online in chatrooms, news groups and messaging sites.

Trained officers pose as children to gather evidence against offenders seeking to groom victims and officers also pretend to be offenders who offer to exchange indecent images.