I am very proud to know many of the people working tirelessly at the Canadian Centre for Child Protection and honoured that to call them friends.
[box type=”shadow” align=”aligncenter” ]TORONTO – At least 386 children have been rescued from sexual exploitation and hundreds of suspects arrested in a sweeping child pornography investigation that began with a Toronto man, police revealed Thursday.[/box][divider]The protection of children is all of our responsibility. We are not powerless, it is in our control.
~ Lianna McDonald, Executive Director of the Canadian Centre for Child Protection
Media Release
Thursday morning, the Toronto Police Service (with representation from the Canadian Centre for Child Protection) announced the results of Project SPADE, an investigation stemming in part from reports made to Cybertip.ca (read the press release). These reports helped law enforcement to identify websites that, upon further investigation, led to the arrest of close to 350 offenders from around the world, as well as the removal of nearly 400 children from abusive environments.
What is particularly troubling is that for a number of the individuals arrested, their professions or volunteer work provided close contact with children. This highlights the importance of child-serving organizations having the tools in place to help reduce the likelihood that an offender will successfully gain access to and sexually abuse a child in their care. One such tool is the Canadian Centre for Child Protection’s Commit to Kids program. Specifically tailored to assist child-serving organizations in creating safer environments for the children in their care, this program provides organizations with a step-by-step plan using a risk-management approach that goes far beyond criminal record checks to prevent child sexual abuse.
“Prevention is key, especially in child-serving organizations that may attract employees and volunteers looking to access and sexually offend against children,” says Detective Sgt. Kim Gross, Toronto Police Service. “Commit to Kids is an invaluable child sexual abuse prevention program that helps child-serving organizations better protect the children in their care.”
“The protection of children is all of our responsibility,” says Lianna McDonald, Executive Director of the Canadian Centre for Child Protection. “We are not powerless, it is in our control. An important step toward creating safer communities for our children is to ask that child-serving organizations implement the Commit to Kids prevention program.”
For more information on this program, visit commit2kids.ca.
Please help us encourage Canadians to do more to protect children in their care. To help raise awareness, follow us on Twitter @CdnChildProtect. You can also share our video, available at http://bit.ly/KSXJj1.
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