A 21-year-old Edmonton man has been charged with multiple counts of sexual assault and child pornography after Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams (ALERT) say he lured at least six children to perform sexual acts.
In a news release Wednesday morning, ALERT said an investigation by its Internet Child Exploitation Unit (ICE) that began in June has identified at least six victims of child luring and sexual abuse.
Sergeant Kerry Shima, operations sergeant for the Northern Alberta ICU, said the alleged offenses took place between September 2021 and June of this year. The victims were between 11 and 13 years old at the time, Shima said.
“Any case where we deal with an 11-year-old child who has been abused by a stranger is extremely frightening and deeply concerning for both the parents and the police,” he said.
ALERT alleges the man targeted the young girls via Snapchat and in some cases gained access to the victim’s contacts through blackmail.
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“Child luring occurs when certain predators deliberately misrepresent themselves as adults in front of these children in order to gain their trust or lose rapport in order to exploit them – to get pictures, videos and in this case we we believe this is actually dating and sexually assaulting each other,” Shima said.
“In a general sense, many of these predators will become involved with a group of friends and spread to other associates or contacts.
“Through my experience working in this unit, I realized that in teenage youth culture, a lot of kids add people to their own Snapchat friends list without actually knowing who they are.”
Shima said that although the accused is believed to have met all six victims in person, he is not accused of sexually abusing any of the victims. However, police say he was criminally involved with all of the victims to some degree.
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ALERT said the series of child luring incidents occurred in the Morinville and Edmonton areas.
“We don’t have any information right now to believe that he has any personal connection to this town (Morinville), which makes it that much more, I guess, scary,” Shima said.
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Morinville RCMP and the Zebra Child Protection Center were involved in the investigation, which began after a public tip to the Morinville detachment, Shima said.
ALERT said Imesh Ratnayake was arrested on July 7. He is accused of sexual assault, sexual interference, enticing a child, making child pornography, transmitting child pornography, possession of child pornography, receiving sexual services for payment from persons under 18, solicitation of sexual touching, distribution of intimate images and extortion.
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Ratnayake was released from custody and is due in court in Morinville on August 4. Shima said Ratnayake lives in Edmonton and has been released on conditions.
“The court system has its own way of dealing with things. Is it a concern for us? yes It’s a concern that he’s out on bail. I don’t know what the reason for the release is. We are here talking about other potential victims. The judicial system has created conditions that we believe in, but is it alarming? Yes, said Shima.
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Some of Ratnayake’s release conditions include no communication with the victims, residing in a residence approved by the court, no contact or communication with anyone under the age of 16, no possession or use of any electronic device capable of accessing internet and no access to social media.
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ALERT said investigators have reason to believe there are more victims, and for that reason, they are releasing a photo of the suspect and his vehicle, a 2011 Avura CSX, which ALERT says was used in some of the crimes.
ALERT says Imesh Ratnayake, 21, drives a 2021 Acura CSX. Investigators say he used the vehicle in some of the crimes. Courtesy, WARNING
Ratnayake will be known on Snapchat as “islandsauce0129” or “monked.ruffy,” according to ALERT.
Shima said that when the investigation began, investigators had no information to draw on other than the Snapchat usernames.
“Otherwise we had no information about him. So it’s very worrying for us when someone is out and about, we don’t know who they are, we don’t know where they’re from or what they’re doing. And we’re working with some partners to get that information,” he explained.
“We used our international partnerships and were assisted by them in identifying the accounts, and we have some other investigative techniques that we use once we get certain information from those platforms.”
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Protecting your children online
Shima said there are several things parents can do to help protect their children online. The first is to ensure that their children have somewhere to go or someone they trust to talk to if something happens.
“The most important thing is to make sure your kids are confident and trust you,” he said.
“If children feel that they don’t trust their parents to the depth of something as intimate as sexual abuse, then they may not report it to those parents, and the parents may be shocked one day to discover that something terrible has happened to the children them on their devices.
“We have to get down to our kids’ level, and sometimes it gets down to their level. Getting down to their level, speaking their language and speaking a language they understand. Also coming to their level where they can teach us about these platforms.”
Shima said he himself has teenage children and has had them teach him on various social media platforms. It also encourages parents to educate themselves about the different platforms their children use.
“Every single one of these platforms has parenting guides on the internet. They’re easy to read, very informative graphics — they’re talking adult, they’re talking Gen X — so it’s easy for parents to understand.”
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He also said parents can look for changes in their children’s behavior and not be afraid to have open and honest conversations with their children about sexual abuse, consent, child baiting and online strangers.
“Have those conversations. And in that case, an open question here might be “Do you have any connections online or do you have friends on your Snapchat friend list or Instagram account that you don’t know?” Is there anyone asking you for naked bodies? Is there someone who gives you an unusual compliment? Does someone offer you something for sex? Does anyone offer you anything for pictures?’ These are the types of questions we should be asking our children.”
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According to provincial courts, Ratnayake had no criminal record prior to this incident.
Anyone with information about the suspect or the investigation is asked to contact ICE at 780-509-3363. Anonymous information can be sent to Crime Stoppers.
© 2022 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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