Home Page - Save Our Kids - Where is William Tyrrell

FOR years we’ve heard about the suspected fate of Maddy McCann and William Tyrrell at the hands of a paedophile ring. This week, we have learned they operate much closer to home.

IT’S a terrifying thought.

A group of people who appear to be decent, hardworking members of society, but who in reality hide behind that facade to act on their deviant sexual desires for children.

Paedophiles are experts at deception and carefully select their victims who, more often than not, fly under the radar, unpunished, for decades. And sometimes forever.

The worst of them don’t just abuse their victims — they share and trade them with other paedophiles like objects.

Several experts spoken to by news.com.au say these paedophile rings are far more common than most Australians would realise. Last week, the head of the NSW Homicide Squad, Detective Superintendent Michael Willing revealed a shocking twist in the investigation into the disappearance of William Tyrrell — there could be a paedophile ring operating on the mid-north coast of New South Wales where the three-year-old was last seen.

“We have information that involves the possibility that there is a paedophile ring that is operating and that may be connected to William’s disappearance. We are vigorously pursuing that information, I can tell you that.”

Dr Freda Briggs, Emeritus Professor in Child Development at the University of South Australia, said paedophile rings were happening in Australia and had been for years.

She’d interviewed victims who told of her of abuse that started when they were young children and didn’t stop until their mid-teens. “Many of the victims are young boys who [more so than girls] tend not to report it.”

Their abusers were “wealthy men across all walks of life” who you wouldn’t normally suspect were capable of such appalling behaviour.

Dr Briggs said the internet had helped these paedophiles communicate with each other and share images of abused children online.

“It’s something that wasn’t there before, so it was a lot harder for them. Now there are websites that you can only be a member of if you upload pictures of children, sometimes thousands of them.”

“You just have to know where to look. It’s easy for them to get involved.”

She’d been told by police that overseas paedophiles saw Australia as an opportunity because of perceived weaker sentencing.

“They catch people in the US who are coming here to get a child.”

It was her belief the subject, as unpleasant as it was, needed to be spoken about more.

“It’s not nice at all and for most people you’ll never expect it to happen to you or your child ... It’s like a road accident - it happens to other people.”

Paedophiles get away with their crimes because they operate “under the radar” and were “experts at deception”.

“They’re masters at manipulation and manipulate everyone around the safety of children.”

That was no more evident when people were charged with child sex crimes. Dr Briggs said the usual reaction was one of utter disbelief.

“Nobody wants to believe they’re guilty of it.”

She told news.com.au it was important to understand how these criminals worked because that meant they could be stopped and the cycle of abuse was broken. Many paedophiles were themselves “damaged” by sexual predators.

One of the reasons some victims went on to become abusers themselves and others didn’t could be directly related to how often they were abused and for what length of time.

Criminologist Carol Ronken, research manager at children’s charity Bravehearts, said part of the difficulty in combating paedophiles and busting the rings open was people didn’t know what they were looking for.

“It’s frustrating, what the perception of an offender is. People have this idea of what a paedophile looks like but that often isn’t the reality.”

She hadn’t seen evidence of paedophile rings but was aware they “supported each other” — and their modus operandi was built around calculating moves to win the trust of children and their family, then isolate them and finally, abuse them.

Paedophiles could strike at any time when an opportunity presented itself, such as what may have happened to William Tyrrell and what did happen to Queensland 13-year-old Daniel Morcombe in 2003, who was abducted and murdered by paedophile Brett Cowan.

But Ms Ronken said others carefully lay the foundations of their crimes by integrating with a community. It was cunning and “calculating” behaviour.

She agreed education was the key to stopping the scourge of paedophiles and ensuring children knew it was okay to tell someone if they were being abused.

Because the statistics show, if the abuse goes unnoticed, then another small child could pay for it many years later.