By Michael Hewlett
BEDFORD --- Producers for "48 Hours," the CBS investigative
news show,
came here Thursday to interview Sheriff Mike Brown as
part of a story on
Operation Blue Ridge Thunder.
Operation Blue Ridge Thunder is a county task force that
fights child
pornography and child abuse on the Internet. The show
had been planning
a program on the dark side of the Internet, and during
its research
became aware of the problem of sexual predators luring
children through
the Internet, said Josh Gelman, a producer for "48 Hours."
In the midst of talking with several agencies in the country,
Gelman
contacted Brown and the more he learned about Operation
Blue Ridge
Thunder, the more Gelman became convinced to make the
Bedford County
program a part of the show. The program, which usually
airs at 10 p.m.
on Thursday, is scheduled to air in late March [March
30]. Correspondent
Peter Van Sant will be the reporter for the March show.
In addition to interviewing Brown and some of the other
investigators,
producers also followed Operation Blue Ridge officials
as they
investigated a case. Gelman declined to give specific
information on the case.
"They couldn't have been more generous with the time,"
he said.
Operation Blue Ridge Thunder was started by the Bedford
County Sheriff's
Office in 1998 as a way to capture pedophiles via the
Internet. Since
the program's inception, the program has gotten a national
reputation
for leading the country in catching child predators.
Money for the
program comes from a $200,000 grant from the U.S. Department
of Justice.
No local money is used. The program will receive the
grant through 2002,
Brown said.
Getting national exposure for Operation Blue Ridge Thunder
only helps
the program --- not hinder it, Brown said Thursday. "We
couldn't ask for
anything better than national exposure," he said. In
fact, one of the
conditions for the grant is to disseminate information
about the program
and the problem of Internet child sex crimes through
the print and
broadcast media.
Bedford County was one of 10 agencies to receive the grant
from the U.S.
Department of Justice in 1998, and out of the all the
agencies that
received the grant, Bedford was the smallest. Other departments
were
from large urban areas such as Dallas, Texas; Sacramento,
Calif.; and
Broward County, Fla.
"We found it was a unique situation for a small agency
to do some of the
best work in the country," Gelman said Thursday. After
about two months
on the story, Gelman said he and other crew members learned
how
dangerous the Internet can be for children. Brown agreed.
"They had no idea," he said. Another attraction for "48
Hours" was the
access Brown allowed the program's producers.
"Mike Brown was the only one who said, 'We'll give you
all the access
you need,'" he said.
There were times where Brown had to set limits on what
the program's
producers could film, but everytime, they understood
the need for
security and confidentiality, Brown said.
This won't be the first time that Operation Blue Ridge
Thunder has been
in the limelight. Last year, Brown and other members
of Operation Blue
Ridge Thunder briefed Congress on the program. With assistance
from the
Office of the Bedford County Commonwealth's Attorney,
Operation Blue Ridge
Thunder has investigators assigned to track and arrest
people who are
involved with child pornography and who solicit minors
for illicit
purposes through the Internet.
Gelman said he talked with about 20 agencies involved
in this type of
work but most either couldn't give the access Brown had
or were just
beginning those programs. Work by Operation Blue Ridge
Thunder has
resulted in several convictions.
In January, Tom D. Rice, an aide to former West Virginia
Gov. Gaston
Caperton, was sentenced to a minimum of five years and
three months in
prison for crossing state lines to have sex with a minor.
Also in
January, Raymond P. Canupp, 47, a bus mechanic from Charlotte,
N.C., was
sentenced in federal court to three years for soliciting
a Bedford
County minor for sex. A "48 Hours" crew shot footage
of the sentencing.
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BACK
The
News & Advance, Lynchburg, Va., Friday, 11 February, 2000