Tools to protect children from sexual abuse

As the community observes Child Abuse Prevention Month, Monday brought word of new tools for Oneida County law enforcement to combat criminal acts against children.

State Sen. Joseph Griffo, R- 47, announced $15,000 in funding to purchase new equipment for the Oneida County Child Advocacy Center to better investigate cases of child abuse. Griffo was joined by Oneida County and law enforcement officials Monday afternoon at the Child Advocacy Center in West Utica to highlight the unique advantage this new equipment will give the center in conducting its investigations.

The items to be purchased include a Voice Stress Analyzer, as well as a Cellebrite Mobile Cell Phone Extraction Device that will allow the Child Advocacy Center to immediately search cell phones for texts or images relevant to sex crime investigations. Griffo secured this funding from the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Program, which provides federal funding to state and local jurisdictions.

“We must never tolerate any crime against our children, and therefore it is important that our local law enforcement agencies continue to have the resources they need to swiftly bring these predators to justice,” Griffo said. “The Oneida County Child Advo-

cacy Center for years has exemplified the success that police can have by working together in a cooperative effort to protect our children, and I am proud to secure this funding to help make the CAC even more efficient in its investigations.

“Child abuse cases aren’t easy to investigate, and they can affect so many families in our community, but the more prepared our police and prosecutors are in getting to the truth in these instances, the better we can act in the best interests of our most vulnerable boys and girls,” said Griffo.

Voice Stress Analyzer: Many of the cases investigated by the Child Advocacy Center involve questions of he said-she said between suspects and victims, so it is important for law enforcement to be able to accurately assess the truth of a suspect’s statements. While the CAC typically assesses a suspect’s voice using equipment at other local police agencies, equipping the CAC with its own portable Voice Stress Analyzer will allow investigators to conduct these analyses off-site in a more timely manner without waiting for a trained officer to arrive. The CAC currently only has one investigator trained in voice stress analysis. With this funding, the CAC plans to train two additional investigators in this skill. Based on this training, CAC investigators will be able to assess charted fluctuations in a suspect’s spoken voice to identify any signs of deception.

Celebrite Mobile Cell Phone Extraction Device: Last year, the Child Advocacy Center investigated 698 cases, with more than 70 percent of the investigations involving some form of cellphone or texting communication. Now that the CAC has started its own Internet Crime Investigations Unit to field cyber tips from the FBI and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, this Cellebrite mobile kit will make it easier for the CAC to quickly and efficiently gather the contents of a person’s cell phone. Instead of always having to send cell phones to be analyzed at a forensic center, which can be very time consuming, the CAC will now be able to collect in-house any text messages, photographs or videos from a person’s phone – even if they already have been deleted – and quickly return the phone back to its owner. As the only local agency that would possess this equipment, CAC investigators believe the Cellebrite portable device will be a very effective tool in resolving the mounting cases of child pornography, sexting or other child abuse.

“I cannot thank Sen. Griffo enough for his continuous support of Oneida County’s law enforcement and for his compassion toward the children of our community, especially those served by the Oneida County Child Advocacy Center,” said Oneida County Sheriff Rob Maciol.