CLOSE Federal authorities announced the arrest of at least 70 people in the New York area accused of downloading child pornography. Among them, a rabbi, a boy scout leader and a police chief. (May 21) AP 
 
 Former Mount Pleasant, N.Y., police chief Brian Fanelli exits federal court in White Plains, N.Y., on Jan. 13. A five-week investigation has resulted in child porn charges against at least 70 men and one woman in the New York City area. (Photo: Tania Savayan, The Journal News, via AP) 
 
 NEW YORK — Two police officers, a rabbi, a registered nurse, a nanny and a Boy Scout den leader are among 70 men and one woman arrested on charges of trading child pornography in what federal officials say is one of the largest-ever roundups in the New York City area. 
 
 The arrests included a woman charged with producing and distributing child pornography involving her own child and a man who used hidden cameras to secretly film his naked stepdaughter. 
 
 Still another defendant was already on bail following his arrest last year on charges that he used the Internet to direct women to record sex acts with young children. Court papers allege he "indicated the last video he had downloaded and viewed depicted a mother sexually abusing her 3- or 4-year-old child." 
 
 One had been convicted and sentenced for raping someone younger than 11 years old. 
 
 'THE DARK WEB': Untangling cybercrime 
 
 The arrests were part of a federal investigation that resulted in the seizure of nearly 600 desktop and laptop computers, tablets, smartphones and other devices, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations said in a press release Wednesday. Some of those possessed libraries with thousands of sexually explicit images and videos of children. 
 
 At a press conference announcing the 71 arrests, officials laid out tools used by the suspects to acquire the illicit materials. 
 
 On a long table, 22 hard drives, 5 tablet computers, 7 discs, 4 SD cards and one laptop sat as evidence of wrongdoings. A large map with red dots showed that the suspects were from all over New York state and parts of New Jersey. 
 
 A poster board displayed photos, names and occupations of five men arrested as part of the operation: Brian Fanelli, a former police chief; Samuel Waldman, a rabbi; Yong Wu, a police officer; Jonathan Silber, a Boy Scout leader and Little League baseball coach;and Aaron Young, a paramedic. 
 
 A board displaying images of five men arrested on child pornography charges in the New York City area. (Photo: Yamiche Alcindor) 
 
 At a press conference, James Hayes, the head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations New York office, said officials are certain there will be more charges against the 71 people arrested and possibly more arrests. 
 
 "These defendants came from all walks of life," Hayes said. "Many of these defendants are well-educated and successful." 
 
 None of the victims in the images found on the computers has been identified, Hayes said. 
 
 The expansion of the "Dark Web," where pedophiles hide using websites that encrypt their computers' identifying information, has fueled an explosion of child pornography. 
 
 "The sheer volume of confirmed and suspected instances of individuals engaging in the sexual exploitation of children … is shocking and the professional backgrounds of many of the defendants is troubling. We can no longer assume that the only people who would stoop to prey on children are unemployed drifters," Hayes said. "Clearly, this criminal activity has reached epidemic proportions." 
 
 “The sheer volume of confirmed and suspected instances of individuals engaging in the sexual exploitation of children … is shocking and the professional backgrounds of many of the defendants is troubling.” James Hayes, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement 
 
 He said the announcement of 71 arrests should send a message to predators: "that they are going to be identified and found." 
 
 Child pornographers have a compulsion to trade images and videos like baseball cards. The more graphic the image, the more they trade it. That leads investigators to convoluted cases where one defendant leads to another who leads to others. 
 
 Queens District Attorney Richard Brown emphasized that the children pictured in pornographic images are victimized in serious crimes. 
 
 "These are real children involved in despicable acts," Brown said. "Each time an image is viewed, traded, printed, or downloaded, the child in that image is victimized again." 
 
 Brooklyn District Attorney Kenneth Thompson said, "This case underscores the crucial importance of internet surveillance initiatives by law enforcement to protect children from sexual predators." 
 
 This case started with the arrests of a police chief and a rabbi who had been using peer-to-peer file-sharing programs to exchange images, Hayes said. 
 
 He said the investigation began because officials, after making several child pornography arrests, became concerned about the number of people in the New York area actively searching for sexual images of children. 
 
 "Our investigation revealed that at any given point in time there are as many as 3,000 users searching for pornographic images of children on a variety of peer-to-peer networks," Hayes said. 
 
 Hayes said investigators went on peer-to-peer networking sites and pretended to be users looking for images and videos. They came across search terms like, "real child rape," "mom daughter family sex," and "3-year-old gets it every way imaginable." 
 
 STORY: N.Y. police chief faces child pornography charges 
 
 STORY: File-sharing network key in police chief's child porn arrest 
 
 In January, investigators arrested Fanelli, the police chief of suburban Mount Pleasant, N.Y. He pleaded not guilty this week to federal charges of knowingly receiving and distributing child pornography. 
 
 Court papers allege that Fanelli, 54, told investigators that he taught sexual abuse awareness classes to elementary and middle school students. He said he began looking at child porn as research for the classes and that it grew into a "personal interest." Court documents say two of his computers had 126 graphic video and photo files of children as young as 7 engaging in sex acts with other children and adults. 
 
 Investigators say they caught Fanelli by using software available only to law enforcement that identifies IP addresses of computers that have downloaded files known to be child pornography. Agents used the software to match Fanelli to a computer that shared sexually explicit images of children. 
 
 Two months later, HSI agents arrested Waldman, 52, a Brooklyn rabbi and Judaic studies instructor at a girls' seminary. The rabbi home-schooled his children and others. Court documents showed investigators found at least three graphic videos on Waldman's computer. 
 
 Given the positions of public trust held by Fanelli and Waldman, federal officials said investigators ramped up their investigation into other pornographers the men may have been in touch with. 
 
 STORY: Child porn sting: Local scout leader, nurse among 70 arrested 
 
 A torrent of arrests followed in April and May, several of which were of defendants with high-profile positions in the community, federal officials said. 
 
 The arrests included Kenneth Gardner, a registered nurse at Westchester County Medical Center and Eduardo Salcedo Urzola, a nanny. 
 
 It was startling to find evidence that a woman made lewd videos of her son, Hayes said. 
 
 "It's very rare for us to identify women who are involved in this type of crime," he said. 
 
 In total, investigators nabbed people in all five boroughs and the surrounding suburbs to the north of the city, in Long Island and in New Jersey. 
 
 Those arrested are between 20 and 60 years old. They traded photos of children as young as 2. 
 
 Some face federal charges and others state charges. Hayes said officials in some cases decided to partner with local police departments to ensure that suspects would be arrested and charged as quickly as possible. 
 
 Agents are still examining the computers and other devices for evidence — an arduous task that could result in more arrests, HSI said. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children will review the images to try to identify children using databases of known victims. 
 
 Bello reported from McLean, Va. 
 
 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1np6AKA ||||| Buy Photo Mount Pleasant police Chief Brian Fanelli and his wife Sonja exit Federal Court Jan. 23, 2014 in White Plains. Fanelli was freed on $50,000 bail after appearing in federal court to face child pornography charges, hours after federal agents raided his Mahopac home and seized computers containing more than 120 files of children as young as 7 years old engaging in sex acts.(Photo: Tania Savayan/The Journal News) (Photo: (Photo: Tania Savayan/The Journal News))Buy Photo 
 
 A single dad in Mahopac secretly videotaped his son's 9-year-old friend in a swimming pool changing room, while a Westchester Medical Center nurse had 19 videos of children under 13 having sex with adults, authorities said Thursday as new details emerge about a regional crackdown on Internet child pornography. 
 
 Among the more than 70 people charged was also a Port Chester man who had allegedly been downloading child porn for five years and a Kent man, charged with having images of girls as young as 6, whose father was deported six years ago for setting up a sexual tryst with a 14-year-old girl at a Wendy's restaurant in Chicago. 
 
 Advocates contend it's a small fraction of the disturbing illegal industry. 
 
 "How many more children are not counted? How much child porn is still out there?" said Keira Pollock, deputy executive director of programs and clinical services at the New City-based Center for Safety & Change. "It seems like there's this epidemic hidden industry that continues to profit off of children." 
 
 Special Agent in Charge James T. Hayes Jr., head of the New York office of Homeland Security Investigations, speaks about Operation Caireen, which resulted in the arrests of 70 men and one woman on child porn charges over the past five weeks Jonathan Bandler 
 
 Dubbed "Operation Caireen," the crackdown was headed by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and was prompted in part by a probe of then-Mount Pleasant Police Chief Brian Fanelli, who was arrested in January and charged with downloading and distributing 
 
 child pornography. 
 
 At least five of those charged have ties to the Lower Hudson Valley, including Jonathan Silber, 42, a Boy Scout den leader and Little League coach from Suffern, who was arrested at his home on May 9 and charged with possessing child pornography. Federal investigators said an IP address connected to Silber was used to distribute pornographic images online. 
 
 Silber and his wife, an elementary school teacher, have two young sons about 5 and 9 in age, neighbors said. Silber works as a systems analyst and project manager for Tranzact, a Fort Lee, N.J. company that helps insurance companies with direct-to-consumer sales. The company did not return calls for comment. 
 
 The arrest came as a shock to neighbors, who described Silber as a "typical Rockland neighbor." 
 
 "Surprised? I was shocked," said Vic Robbins, 66, a retiree who lives across the street. "He's always got kids at his house. He's very active in the community. Lovely wife. Two nice kids… I would never have any suspicion that anything wasn't normal." 
 
 Other local defendants include John Asmodeo, 30, a computer technician who was temporarily living in Mahopac. He was arrested April 23 and accused of setting up a camera in a changing room to film his son's friend when she changed to go swimming. The girl would visit the home with her 7-year-old brother, but police said Asmodeo would edit out anyone else who appeared on the videos. 
 
 Authorities said Asmodeo had visitation rights to see his 9-year-old son at the home. They said the girl was interviewed by Child Protective Services and did not appear to have been physically abused or molested. Asmodeo was freed on a $10,000 bond posted Wednesday. 
 
 Kenneth Gardner, 59, a speciality STAT Flight nurse at Westchester Medical Center, was arrested at his home in Astoria, Queens on April 8. Gardner, who is married, is charged with possessing and prompting a sexual performance by a child, according to a complaint filed by the Queens District Attorney's Office. 
 
 He has been a licensed registered nurse since 1986, having worked at New York Hospital before moving to the Valhalla medical center in 1992. Hospital officials said in a statement Thursday that Gardner "was immediately and indefinitely suspended without pay" after his arrest. He could lose his nursing license if convicted. 
 
 Solomon Ben, 29, of Port Chester, was charged with possessing and receiving child pornography in a federal complaint filed April 28. Authorities said Ben had been viewing pornographic files for up to five years. He was later released on bail. 
 
 Agents said they first questioned him at his home on Nov. 18, and that he "had a preference for child pornography depicting girls approximately thirteen to fourteen years old." He could not be reached for comment. 
 
 Christian Cote, 26, of Kent, was arrested April 9 and charged with possessing images of girls as young as 6. The Putnam County District Attorney's Office said in a statement that investigators seized a laptop, desktop computer and a mobile phone. They also found a small amount of marijuana, authorities said. 
 
 His father, Francois Cote, was deported to Canada in 2008 after being released from federal prison, where he served time for traveling from Newark to Chicago, intending to have sex with a 14-year-old girl he met online. 
 
 Mount Pleasant police chief Brian Fanelli and wife, Sonja, exit U.S. District Court, Jan. 23, 2014, in White Plains. He was freed on $50,000 bail after appearing in federal court to face child pornography charges. Tania Savayan/The Journal News 
 
 The girl was actually a Cooks County sheriff's detective, who Cote greeted with a hug in 2003 at a Wendy's restaurant. Her greeting "wasn't nearly so warm," a federal judge wrote in the case, as Cote was arrested by FBI agents and sheriff's deputies. 
 
 The current investigation – named for Caireen, the protector and patron of children in Celtic mythology – focused on online peer-to-peer, or "P2P", file-sharing that allows Interenet users to exchange images and videos. The defendants include a rabbi, two other police officers, an airline pilot and an architect. Investigators said additional charges could be lodged against some of them. 
 
 Staff writers Lee Higgins, Jonathan Bandler and Hoa Nguyen contributed to this report. 
 
 Twitter: @jfitzgibbon, @corcoranterence, @alextailored, @leehiggins, @jonbandler, @reporterhoa 
 
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– More disturbing details are emerging about this week's huge child-porn bust in the New York City area, including these: a dad secretly filmed his son's friend, 9, when she changed to go swimming; a nurse had 19 videos of kids under 13 having sex with adults, authorities say. Another man, whose father was deported in 2008 after flying to Chicago in hopes of having sex with a 14-year-old girl, is charged with having images of girls as young as six, the Journal News reports. As for the Boy Scout leader and Little League coach, Jonathan Silber, 42, authorities say an IP address connected to the father of two was used to distribute child pornography online. "Surprised? I was shocked," said one of Silber's neighbors. "He's always got kids at his house. He's very active in the community … I would never have any suspicion that anything wasn't normal." Others charged in "Operation Caireen" (a nod to the protector and patron of kids in Celtic mythology) include a mother charged with producing pornography involving her own child, USA Today reports.