Tale of Two Pedophiles: 288 Counts in Florida Child Porn Ring, Rape of an Idaho Five-Year-Old
There lay deep within the criminal underworld of America a darkened-heart filled with a pedophile epidemic, and today we're going to visit two cases, where one faces 288 counts of Child Porn, and another has raped a five-year-old child.
We begin explaining this perverse and abominable derangement with a 55-year-old Mark Ashcroft in Bonifay, Florida, who was caught as part of the largest online distribution of child pornography in Florida history, as reported by local CBS affiliate WTVY Channel 4.
The Holmes County Sheriff's Deputies worked in cooperation with the Walton County Sheriff's Office, the United States Department of Homeland Security, and the North Florida Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force (ICACT) for six weeks to uncover the network of child pornographic distribution.
The case began with the Walton County Sheriff's Office in Franklin County monitoring activity on a file-sharing network hub.
Deputies said that's where countless images, and videos, all of which depicted prepubescent children engaged in forced sexual assault with adults; had been shared for the period of the investigation.
Eventually, law enforcement traced the source where the child pornography originated from, only to find it coming from a home on North Highway 79 in Bonifay.
Quickly obtaining a search warrant, agents and Deputies then planned and executed a raid on a residential property belonging to 55-year-old Mark Ashcroft.
Inside the home, they found and seized a computer which could be visibly seen both transmitting child pornographic files, as well as downloading the illicit materials.
Authorities also recovered several portable and external hard drives.
Further forensic analysis of those devices revealed 288 videos depicting explicit imagery of children between the ages of 7 and 15-years-old.
During interrogations with Ashcroft, he openly admitted to downloading and distributing the child pornographic materials and was arrested and charged with 288 counts of possession of child porn, and distribution of child porn transmitted via an electronic device.
Law enforcement has yet to examine all of the portable devices found inside the home and may find additional child pornographic images and videos when finished.
55-year-old Mark Ashcroft is now in the Holmes County Jail on a $2.8 million bond.
http://www.thegoldwater.com/news/36908-Tale-of-Two-Pedophiles-288-Counts-in-Florida-Child-Porn-Ring-Rape-of-an-Idaho-Five-Year-Old