Back at the end of April, I was skeptical of a claim in the LA Times (Shifting Clues to an Unsmiling Girl) that “all but one” of the more than one hundred people arrested by the Child Exploitation Section of the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit over the past four years was a “hard-core Trekkie” (LA Times Claim About Pedophiles Wrong). I called the unit and spoke to a detective who told me that the claim was exaggerated, but that a substantial number of those arrested were Star Trek fans. The LA Times stood by its “all but one” claim, but I remained skeptical (Star Trek and Pedophilia Claim Followup).
Last week venerable Canadian publication Maclean’s published a story that had as its hook the Star Trek/Pedophilia connection found by the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit (The Star Trek Connection). And what a connection it is:
The first thing detectives from the Toronto police sex crimes unit saw when they entered Roderick Cowan’s apartment was an autographed picture of William Shatner. Along with the photos on the computer of Scott Faichnie, also busted for possessing child porn, they found a snapshot of the pediatric nurse and Boy Scout leader wearing a dress “Federation” uniform. Another suspect had a TV remote control shaped like a phaser. Yet another had a Star Trek credit card in his wallet. One was using “Picard” as his screen name. In the 3 1/2 years since police in Canada’s biggest city established a special unit to tackle child pornography, investigators have been through so many dwellings packed with sci-fi books, DVDs, toys and collectibles like Klingon swords and sashes that it’s become a dark squadroom joke. “We always say there are two types of pedophiles: Star Trek and Star Wars,” says Det. Ian Lamond, the unit’s second-in-command. “But it’s mostly Star Trek.”It’s the type of oddball coincidence that’s difficult to ignore. Even more so when you realize there’s virtually nothing else, beyond their shared perversion, that links the new generation of child sex offenders.
However, the article did not repeat the “all but one” claim, so I emailed the author of the article to ask if he could confirm it.
Here is his response:
Lamond told me what he told you, that “all but one” was a bit of hyperbole. However, the cops do stick by their claim that the vast majority of people that they bust seem to have an obsession with sci-fi. And that most of them seem to really like Star Trek. Whether that’s the original series, TNG or Deep Space 9, remains open to debate.
As I stated in my original piece on this story, “A weird factoid. Nevertheless, it is not correct that ‘all but one … in the last four years’ was a hard core Star Trek fan.”