Members of the Ministry of Internal Affairs /MIA/ of the Republika Srpska arrested nine people on suspicion of having committed the crimes of exploiting children for pornography, money laundering and illegal production and trafficking of weapons or explosive materials in the previous period of time, the Ministry of Internal Affairs announced today.
The operational action “System 2023” was implemented by the police officers of the High-tech Crime Department of the Criminal Police Directorate in cooperation with the members of the police administrations of Bijeljina, Doboj and Banjaluka.
Acting according to the orders of the competent courts, they conducted searches at eight locations that were found to be used by persons linked to the above-mentioned criminal acts, the MIA pointed out.
“During the search, the means of committing a criminal offense were found and confiscated, namely computers, tablets, mobile phones, USB sticks, memory cards, SIM cards and other devices for storing digital data, as well as other items that can be linked to the commission of a criminal offense. acts, as well as cases that indicate the commission of another criminal act,” the announcement stated.
After the completion of the criminal investigation, the persons will be handed over to the competent prosecutor’s offices along with a report on the crime committed.
Srna news agency unofficially learns that the arrested persons are suspected of having committed the criminal acts in such a way that in the previous period of time, the suspects visited websites that contained materials with photographs of child pornography, downloaded photos and videos from those pages, after which they used social media networks and applications for communication repeatedly shared or received that content.
According to Srna’s information, certain individuals are suspected of having created storage space on remote infrastructures for storing digital data that they found under their control, after which they repeatedly stored child pornography content on said storage space.
According to unofficial data, the suspects, in addition, advertised on social networks that they possessed photos and videos of child pornography, and after that they sent or sold those photos and videos to other persons with monetary compensation, which was made through a payment service “Paypal”, where they had their user accounts where they received payments.
