Winnipeg Man Charged After Live Stream of Sex Assault on 6-year-old in U.S.

Winnipegger directed man in U.S. 'to commit various sexual assaults,' police allege

By Donna Lee, CBC News

Winnipeg police say a 45-year-old man faces several charges in connection with a live stream of a child being sexually assaulted in the United States. (CBC)

A 45-year-old Winnipeg man faces child exploitation charges after police discovered a live stream of a six-year-old being sexually assaulted in the United States.

Winnipeg police said investigators with the internet child exploitation unit found a live stream had been established on a "popular instant messaging/live-streaming app" with a man in the U.S., who has yet to be identified.

The U.S. man was "directed to commit various sexual assaults against the child" by a person in Winnipeg, police allege.

The young victim, who also hasn't been identified, was in the U.S. man's care, police said.

"We know that … investigators here, and our counterparts in the U.S. who are actively working with Winnipeg police, have not been able to identify either … the suspect who's doing the assaults or the victim at this point in time," Winnipeg police Const. Rob Carver told reporters on Thursday.

"That is still ongoing, which is why we're still working with U.S. law enforcement, Homeland Security, to see if we can ultimately identify this child and locate them."

If this creep is convicted, Canada's 'justice' system will ensure that he gets a slap on the wrist and a semi-severe tongue-lashing. If the judge is in a bad mood, he might get a few months in jail then he can return to society and destroy lots more little girl's or baby's lives.

App not specified

Police would not specify what app was used in this case, but Carver said people are using popular programs to stream child sexual assaults live.

"The live streaming could be [with] FaceTime, it could be Skype, it could be any number of apps or facilities that allow that type of direct, live communication," Carver said.

Greg Alan Jamieson, 45, of Winnipeg was arrested on Monday and charged with making child pornography, sexual interference and agreeing to or arranging a sexual offence against a child for the purposes of child exploitation and making child pornography.

He already faces charges of possessing and making child pornography after investigators found child sexual abuse images, involving victims as young as eight months old, at a Winnipeg home in November 2016. He was detained at the time but later released on bail.

Police say the live stream appears to have taken place sometime before Jamieson's initial arrest in November, but investigators found out about it as they continued investigating after his arrest.

'On-demand sexual abuse'

Live streams of child sexual abuse are on the rise, said Signy Arnason of Cybertip.ca, a child exploitation tip line operated by the Winnipeg-based Canadian Centre for Child Protection.

Arnason said her organization alone received 50 reports of live streams in 2016-17 — up from 20 in 2015-16.

"It's a lens into the fact that this is shifting and moving, and this idea of on-demand sexual abuse is something that's happening among the offending community," she said.

"They connect within these different forums and chat rooms where individuals reinforce and collaborate and have their cognitive distortions around how this is all OK, and then they move over into Skype or some live streaming function where they can be potentially executing what was occurring to this six-year-old."

Both Arnason and Carver said child exploitation cases like this are more common than people may think.

"We know through the experience of the tip line, as well as the child exploitation units across this country, that we're seeing this happen at an alarming rate in relation to children," said Arnason.

"So we need the word to get out there that this is happening directly in our communities. It's not something way off there. It could be someone you know."