With the reading of the more than 400-page long indictment, the trial against four men who are said to have operated the child pornographic platform "BoysTown", which can only be accessed via the Darknet, began this Wednesday at the Frankfurt Regional Court.
The Frankfurt Public Prosecutor's Office accuses a 49-year-old from the district of Mühldorf am Inn and a 59-year-old from northern Germany of having "lead" the platform in the summer of 2019 in order to make it available to the scene.
Anna Sophia Lang
Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.
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On “BoysTown”, the more than 400,000 members from all over the world had access to image and video files, some of which showed the most severe sexual abuse of children, especially boys.
When the Federal Criminal Police Office and the Attorney General's Office shut down the platform in April 2021, there were more than 1,040,000 forum posts there.
According to the investigators, "BoysTown" had chat areas in different languages.
According to the prosecutors, the 49-year-old defendant was responsible for operating the server and worked as a moderator and administrator in the forum.
He is also said to have sexually abused two children, some of them severely, in at least 17 cases between 2005 and 2008 and 2019 and 2021.
In some cases he is said to have taken pictures and shared them with others via messenger service.
According to the indictment, the 59-year-old defendant lived in Paraguay and was extradited to Germany.
A forty-one-year-old from Paderborn, who is said to have sexually abused two children and who is said to have checked the members' contributions on "BoysTown", also has to answer for himself in the process.
He is also said to have advised the members on how to avoid prosecutors.
The fourth accused, 65 years old and from Hamburg, is said to have been one of the most active users and to have written more than 3,600 posts.
All of the accused are in custody.
Investigations against other members are ongoing.