Excerpt

TAMPA, Fla. — Florida law enforcement recovered 163 missing children during a five-day statewide operation, Attorney General James Uthmeier and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement announced Tuesday.

The children, ranging in age from two months to 17 years old, were located during Operation Statewide Shield, a first-of-its-kind state agency-led initiative focused on finding missing, endangered and exploited children.

  • ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net
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    13 hours ago

    Uthmeier said many of the children had experienced abuse, neglect or exploitation, with some believed to have been victims of human trafficking.

    At least three arrests have resulted from the operation, with charges involving lewd and lascivious acts involving minors, lewd and lascivious battery, interference with child custody and resisting officers without violence. Officials said additional arrests are expected as investigations continue.

    So they only “believe” that “some” children where victims of human trafficking. Only three arrests. This really doesn’t sound like they broke up some network of pedophiles like people imagine. My guess is most cases were some custody battles (one parent kidnaps the kid) and runaways. I imagine those are low priority cases for police so that’s why they didn’t look for them earlier.

  • Bwaz@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    I would find it hard to believe “Florida law enforcement” was involved in anything related to actually helping kids not from wealthy families.

  • Insayn@reddthat.com
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    16 hours ago

    I imagine Flock cameras would claim credit…if they actually helped in any way. No…they did not? Unsurprising

  • FirstCircle@lemmy.ml
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    19 hours ago

    “operation”. Everything has to be an “operation” now, even if you’re just doing something routine and boring … has to be an “operation” because that sounds like some sort of glorious large-scale military thing … World War Two-ey even, and yes, yes, a glorious victory is in store, a victory not seen since, well, WW2! I think I’ll go food shopping today, let’s see, “Operation Rotten Banana”. Houseclean a little… “Operation Airtight Vacuum”. Probably take a shit later - “Operation Excreta President”. All will succeed, fabulous successes like nobody has ever seen, not since Patton probably, yeah, nobody can stop these operations, they’re yuge, especially that last one.

    • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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      17 hours ago

      It’s part of the militarization of the police which is absolutely a page out of the authoritarian playbook.

  • daannii@lemmy.worldOP
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    1 day ago

    The cynic in me wonders why this type of operation isnt being conducted regularly. And also, I worry it’s going to be used to promote mass surveillance.

    Ill try to just be happy these kids are safe now.

    • AA5B@lemmy.world
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      24 hours ago

      They didn’t say anything about any investigative breakthrough. Cynical me went right to “it was so easy, why haven’t they been doing their jobs all along?”

    • puzzleheadedegg1499@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      I too can’t help but feel like it’s a double edged sword. Of course it’s great news that they saved 163 kids.

      But it said it was the result of a 5 day operation. To me that seems a bit too simple and easy… why don’t the just keep doing it or do it again if all it takes is 5 days of manpower? Seems like the payoff is exponentially more than the cost.

      • FluorideMind@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        That’s simply not how investigation works? They had a breakthrough that led to some actionable lead that resulted in arrests after 5 days.

        It’s not 5 days of laying bricks to build a house, it’s searching in the woods until you find one, however long it takes.

    • eurodyne@piefed.world
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      1 day ago

      Uthmeier said his office has arrested more than 2,000 people accused of crimes against children since he took office and that more than 400 missing children have been recovered through law enforcement efforts during that period.

      According to him (the FL Attorney General, the guy making the announcement), it is an ongoing effort.

  • Funkt4st1c@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    I can almost guarantee they extended the suffering of many of these victims just so they could get the number. I also can guarantee it was originally either 200 or 175, but some of those victims died before they could get to them.

  • Brkdncr@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    Were they waiting so they could get them all in one week? Why not just get them when you know where they are?

    • diablicja@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      This sort of thinking makes doing nothing the only winning move. Can we just be happy for a minute?