Monday 10 March 2014

To the world they appeared as model parents with a beautiful son. But the happy facade set up by Australian citizen Peter Truong and his American partner Mark Newton concealed the darkest of secrets.

They claimed he was their surrogate child. But Newton and Truong had actually bought him for US$8,000, the result of an unwanted pregnancy. They sexually trained and groomed their son to be exploited by a network of men around the world, known as 'Boy Lovers'. The abuse began when he was less than two years old.

Next on Four Corners, with unprecedented access, reporter Caro Meldrum-Hanna tells the inside story of the extraordinary global investigation, involving police from three continents, that finally rescued the young boy and put his parents behind bars. The program has obtained never-before-seen videos charting their lives.

With co-operation from authorities in Australia, New Zealand and the United States, Four Corners follows investigators as they uncover a global paedophile ring like no other. The program reveals how the super secret ring operated online, who its members were and how they remained hidden behind walls of sophisticated encryption for almost two decades. During that time, members of the network were able to produce millions of images and videos depicting the sexual exploitation of children. Four Corners exposes Truong's connection to this network.

Four Corners reveals how the key that unlocked the conspiracy was a henna tattoo.

This global story ends in Florida, where Meldrum-Hanna speaks with the father of the boy, Peter Truong. He is currently in a federal prison serving a 30-year-sentence for his crimes. What you will discover about him is unforgettable.

"The Boy with the Henna Tattoo", reported by Caro Meldrum-Hanna and presented by Kerry O'Brien, goes to air on Monday 10th March at 8.30pm on ABC1. It is repeated on Tuesday 11th March at 11.00am and 11.35pm. It can also been seen on ABC News 24 on Saturday at 8.00pm, ABC iview and at abc.net.au/4corners.

Transcript

The Boy with the Henna Tattoo - Monday 10 March 2014

KERRY O'BRIEN, PRESENTER: A global investigation of paedophilia that will stop you in your tracks, welcome to Four Corners.

Where to start? Yes, tonight's story is shocking and extremely difficult to comprehend, but stay the course, because ultimately it's about the remarkable efforts by investigators around the world to crack a highly secret code and strike a serious blow against the exploitation of the very young, the very vulnerable.

Tonight we take you into the modern age of organised global child sex abuse, in particular it's about a very secretive group of male predators and a young boy who was groomed from infancy by his two male parents in north Queensland and flown to America and Europe to be used for sex.

The internet is at the heart of this story, offenders using deeply imbedded peer-to-peer or file-sharing services and live streaming to exchange huge amounts of child pornography.

They're often run by highly skilled IT professionals and switch internet channels frequently.

A raid against were two highly skilled teams of police working hemispheres apart, each struggling separately to crack the extremely sophisticated conspiracy, it was pure serendipity that brought them together.

A key member of the paedophile conspiracy was an Australian man named Peter Truong, the adoptive father of the young victim. He speaks to Four Corners tonight from his Florida prison cell.

The reporter is Caro Meldrum-Hanna.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA, REPORTER: In a beachside suburb north of Cairns a little boy is playing at home.

(Home video footage of 'Adam')

ADAM: It's a beetle da.

PETER TRUONG: It's a what?

ADAM: It's a beetle that was on this chair. Going on my elbow.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: We can't show his face nor tell you his real name. He is the victim of a crime most of us can't comprehend.

PETER TRUONG: And what's the beetle doing?

ADAM: Beetle walking.

PETER TRUONG: Yeah?

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: It's 2008 and the boy who we'll call Adam is around three years old. His father is behind the camera.

ADAM: He's really tiny

PETER TRUONG: Is he really tiny?

ADAM: Don't hurt yourself.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Adam's parents Australian Peter Truong and his American partner Mark Newton lived a charmed life in tropical Queensland.

IAN WELLS, DETECTIVE SERGEANT, TASKFORCE ARGOS, QLD POLICE: You know they portrayed themselves as the loving couple. It was almost like, I'm not sure of an equivalent, but I was going to say Brady Bunch of Cairns but two dads, beautiful boy, you know.

(Home video in family kitchen with boxes of cakes)

MARK NEWTON: Did you bake those Pete?

PETER TRUONG: No somebody else did.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: They recorded almost every waking moment of their son's life.

MARK NEWTON: What else do we have?

PETER TRUONG: What else do I have? I've got some tarts.

MARK NEWTON: Tarts ah, lovely, lovely, very nice.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Hundreds of hours of high definition videos, thousands of photographs showing a happy family - their public face. All meticulously organised and stored.

But hidden - a much bigger, private collection. Chilling and criminal, documenting their sexual life with Adam.

STEVE DEBROTA, SENIOR COUNSEL, US ATTORNEYS' OFFICE, INDIANAPOLIS: They filmed this poor kid in horrible situations, but also filmed him all the time doing everything else so. So to him being filmed was a very normal thing. He didn't have anybody there to protect him.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: It's almost impossible to fathom that from when he was a toddler Adam was being used for sex.

Trained by his parents to believe it was normal, they began filming when he was 20-months-old.

STEVE DEBROTA: There's no way around the point that this involved acute sexual activity involving this boy. We're not talking about a kid walking on the beach. We're talking about things that no 20-month-old should be exposed to.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: How would you rate the abuse and the acts that were committed on him?

IAN WELLS: How big's your scale? It's, it's at the far end, it's at the extreme. Ah, he was, he was subjected to acts that would put professional, ah, sex workers to shame.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: By the time Adam was four his grooming was almost complete.

Peter Truong and Mark Newton took their young son around the world to meet like-minded men

At airports, in hotel rooms; handing him over to members of a highly secretive international paedophile ring.

JON ROUSE, DETECTIVE INSPECTOR, TASKFORCE ARGOS, QLD POLICE: It was a life that was managed around airports, and travel, and strange men, and I would suggest systematic abuse.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Within their online community, called the 'Man Boy Love Network', Mark Newton and Peter Truong were superstars.

[Talking to Steve DeBrota) They were stars?

STEVE DEBROTA: Rock stars in the community, being able to move a kid around the world and have him victimised by numerous other people and still not be held accountable, that confers status.

JON ROUSE: They knew what they were doing online. They knew how to use the internet. They'd been using the internet for a very long time. They knew how to protect themselves.

STEVE DEBROTA: It worked until they got careless and some of the material ends up, we got our foot in the door.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: It would take a network to beat a network. A team of investigators around the world to rescue young Adam.

It was an inspector in Wellington New Zealand who would raise the first suspicion.

It was August 2011, John Peacock of Internal Affairs had just raided the home of a suspected child sex offender, 33-year-old Craig Broadley.

(Sound of camera shutter, photos of raid)

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Police found a hard drive containing almost 100 files of child pornography. And private folders full of photos, modelling shots, of one boy.

(Inspector Jon Peacock and colleague National Manager Steve O'Brien looking at images)

JON PEACOCK, INSPECTOR, DEPARTMENT OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS, NEW ZEALAND: These are a bit suss aren't they?

STEVE O'BRIEN: The number of them and they've got one hell of a creepy factor to those.

JON PEACOCK: Yeah, I mean he's just posed.

STEVE O'BRIEN: I mean he's a very young kid.

JON PEACOCK: Yeah.

STEVE O'BRIEN: Ok. They're not objectionable, but they're certainly in the sexualised posing area.

JON PEACOCK: The first images we came across were of him on a hill above Wellington airport.

The images showed him posing, quite contrived poses, ah staring directly into camera, lying back, hand behind his head.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: The photos in the collection became more intimate, provocative but not pornographic.

JON PEACOCK: My concern was whether or not the parents of this boy knew that these types of photos had been taken and what else was going on behind the camera.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: So it didn't cross your mind at this stage that this boy's parents were in on it?

JON PEACOCK: No, certainly not.

(Home videos, Craig Broadley exploring caves with Adam, Peter Truong and Mark Newton)

CRAIG BROADLEY: This way.

ADAM: I'm going with Craig.

CRAIG BROADLEY: Here we go.

ADAM: There's stairs up there.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Craig Broadley also had videos of an adventure exploring underground caves.

CRAIG BROADLEY: Watch you head, crawl and bring your leg around, this leg around and I am going to just jump over. I just want to see yep definite water down there.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Describe to me what's happening in those videos. What are you hearing and seeing?

JON PEACOCK: Well I'm seeing a young boy.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: How old?

JON PEACOCK: Six or seven, got protective gloves on, they're walking through some pretty hard core looking caves. It's, it's you know three, three adults and a young boy just exploring some caves.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Where?

JON PEACOCK: At that point I had no idea.

(Home video of the cave exploring)

PETER TRUONG: Ah, Good boy, look at you huh. Off we go, oh, look at that, back up.

MARK NEWTON: Fun.

(Home video of the men and Adam getting back into a car)

PETER TRUONG: Back towards Carpentaria.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: To Jon Peacock, they weren't just innocent travel videos.

PETER TRUONG: We'll see how we go ey? Let's go!

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: There was one big clue: a Queensland numberplate.

Acting on a hunch Jon Peacock sent a freeze frame of the image to his counterpart in Australia, Taskforce Argos in Brisbane.

JON ROUSE: We got their full names and dates of births and where they were born and we ran all of the intelligence checks on where they were from.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNAH: Did they have a criminal background?

JON ROUSE: No we had no criminal history on either of the men.

IAN WELLS: Based on the pictures alone for starters they looked like outdoors, outdoorsy types. You know, we'd done research, we'd found that they'd done an interview with the ABC, when they were trying to adopt and then, you know, the joy and happiness they've had in being able to adopt a child.

ABC RADIO EXCERPT: Putting gender on the agenda, ABC Far North.

PETER TRUONG: Hi. My name is Pete, and this is Mark and our son Adam. We are gay dads.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Mark Newton and Peter Truong told ABC Radio in Cairns they'd had a child through a surrogate mother in Russia and that Newton was the biological father.

(ABC Radio Cairns interview)

MARK NEWTON: We did artificial insemination with her.

GINGER GORMAN: And how long did that take to work?

PETER TRUONG: About two weeks. That was pretty quick. It took just one attempt in this case to work.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: But this was a lie. Mark Newton wasn't the biological father.

He and Peter Truong had bought Adam for $8000 when he was a baby; an unwanted pregnancy. Adam's birth papers were falsified.

At this early stage in the investigation, Taskforce Argos had no reason to doubt their story.

JON ROUSE: They appeared to be self employed web designers, photographers um, which all married up. So on the face of things everything appearing above board apart from our suspicions around these photographs.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: In Wellington, New Zealand Jon Peacock dug deeper, this time through Craig Broadley's chat logs on Skype.

JON PEACOCK: The names Mark and Peter were mentioned. There were some phrases that were used that brought into very stark highlight the nature of the activity that was going on.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: There were disturbing conversations between a group of men about accessing a boy for sex.

CHAT LOG EXCERPTS:

Two little boys bred for manboy sex.

Just incredible isn't it, what a world to be a part of.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Over thousands of lines of highly explicit chat. The men discussed how Pete had a network around the world and was planning a trip to Germany with his son Adam.

CHAT LOG EXCERPTS:

And they are staying with another boylover - surprise, surprise.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Pete was swapping Adam for sex with another boy.

CHAT LOG EXCERPTS:

Pete does indeed use Adam in 'swap' sessions.

And those sessions are what happens on those trips he makes.

Pete travels the world visiting BL friends and sharing boys.

Fuck this is risky stuff.

Pete is living dangerously.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Pete was Peter Truong. Jon Peacock had discovered a portal; an opening into a depraved world inhabited by Truong and a small group of hardcore paedophiles who called themselves Boylovers.

Young boys were being trafficked for sex.

JON PEACOCK: To have this enterprise as you call it, extend to individuals meeting face to face across borders, transporting Adam is something that was mind-blowing for us, baffling for us. A real shift in the way that we had normally seen this offending taking place. Everything got a lot more serious, this is now child trafficking, this is now physical sexual abuse.

PAUL GRIFFITHS, VICTIM IDENTIFICATION UNIT, TASKFORCE ARGOS, QLD POLICE: It was evident straightaway that you know we didn't have another day to wait, we needed to act then. Um that was when we made all the inquiries you could to establish exactly where in the world they were at the time.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter Truong and Mark Newton had left Australia for another extended international holiday with Adam.

This time, LA.

CARO MELDRUM HANNA: Why were they in the US? Did you have any information?

JON ROUSE: Not at that point in time. But we could only presume that they were travelling with the young boy and my concern would be that they would be meeting up potentially with other sex offenders in the United States.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What the Australian and New Zealand police didn't know was in that same month but on the other side of the world Inspector Brian Bone with the United States Postal Inspection Service, based in Washington DC, was about to uncover a hidden network that would eventually lead back to Newton, Truong and Adam.

Brian Bone's investigation began with one man - a member of an internet relay chat group, 39-year-old Donn Casper.

He lived in a neat house in suburban Idaho. Inside, investigators found a hiding place.

BRIAN BONE, INSPECTOR, US POSTAL INSPECTION SERVICE: One of our, our forensic analysts actually had been walking around and noted that there was a crawlspace and just, as freakishly as it is just by her height, she jumped in and out of the corner of her eyes she found a what looked like a spindle of DVDs.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: So what was on the DVDs?

BRIAN BONE: There were children being sexually abused.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Donn Casper had secretly recorded the abuse and shared it with his online network. A super secret internet relay chat group called 'Tail of the Dragon'.

Over two decades members around the world traded millions of photos and videos depicting young boys, and produced their own child pornography.

'Tail of the Dragon' had remained hidden behind walls of sophisticated security software.

BRIAN BONE: They wanted to be able to thwart law enforcement and they kept track of what law enforcement was doing, what types of investigations we were conducting, and they would talk with other boy lovers in a effort to not get detected by law enforcement.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: 'Tail of the Dragon' was designed and built by its own members - among them, IT pro's, highly skilled with encryption.

All had concealed their identities using multiple screen names and aliases.

The first to be uncovered: AMWoodie, was Donn Casper.

There was also an Australian in the group. Using the alias of RedRover. It was Peter Truong.

BRIAN BONE: We found numerous chat rooms. We found information about other offenders that helped us identify where they were located.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Brian Bone began putting names and faces to aliases, picking members off one by one.

He was led to Indiana where a long term member of Tail of the Dragon was located.

The alias of TazBlunt.

STEVE DEBROTA: Our investigation here in Indiana started when the US Postal Inspection Service came to us and said they thought that some of the members of that group might live in the southern district of Indiana where we were our office is located.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: TazBlunt acted as a librarian for the group.

Indiana Police dispatched a forensic team - skilled in advanced computer encryption - to his house in Anderson, an hour north of Indianapolis.

His real name was Thomas Vaughn, 44-years-old, unemployed and living with his parents.

STEVE DEBROTA: We had a specialised team that is very good at finding small pieces of computer memory. And there's an interview team that was speaking to Mr Vaughn. Then there was a search team that was isolating what computers were inside and running.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What did he collect and what did he value?

STEVE DEBROTA: A large amount of child pornography separated into lots of folders, in some cases giving a clue as to who might the source be based on the name on the folder.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Thomas Vaughn had thousands of folders. One stood out, it was called PrivBeav.

In that private folder, found on a hard drive inside a house on a suburban street here in Anderson Indianapolis were freeze-frames; images taken from a video showing an adult male with a young child around four or five years old.

Their faces had been cropped out.

Investigators had no idea who the man was, nor the young boy.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Had you seen this boy before?

BRIAN BONE: No and that's one of the alarming things which gives it that much more of an urgency because you know that it is a very young child.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: How were you going to find him, he could have been anywhere in the world?

BRIAN BONE: At that point we first had to find who we thought the offender was. We had to locate who was associated with that screen name.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What was the screen name?

BRIAN BONE: Ah, the Beav.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Explicit videos showing 'thebeav' with the same young boy were also found.

Back in Washington, Brian Bone and his team began to scrutinise the images and analyse chat logs from Tail of the Dragon. Looking for clues to identify who 'thebeav' was.

(Inspector Brian Bones talks to analysts)

BRIAN BONE: Were you able to find anything about him in reference to the Internet or any open source research?

LINDSAY: He currently lives in Florida, he might be an attorney, has a connection to New Jersey. I'm trying to others things on social media and public records but not too much yet.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Brian Bone and his team were right, 'thebeav' was a high profile attorney in Florida. Thirty eight years old, his real name - John Rex Powell.

[Talking to Brian Bone] So you had the perpetrator, but you didn't have the victim?

BRIAN BONE: That's correct.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: There was another man in the video - alias SYOBEVOL or loveboys spelt backwards - his real name Jason Bettuo, a 36-year-old junior tennis coach from Michigan.

To find the child the only clues Brian Bone had to go on were visual.

Two images would prove crucial. In the video, the boy had a henna tattoo on his chest and a mole on his stomach.

[Talking to Brian Bone] And at this point in time, the most important thing is to get, is to get to that new boy victim?

BRIAN BONE: Yes, I mean any time that there's new series or new information about victims we do want to, as quickly as possible make sure that child is safe.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: On the other side of the world in Australia Taskforce Argos was completely unaware of Brian Bone's investigation in America.

Detective Ian Wells and his team were leaving police headquarters armed with a search warrant to raid the Cairns home of Peter Truong and Mark Newton.

They were acting on the intelligence from Wellington New Zealand - the chat logs, the modelling photos of Adam.

On a rainy Cairns morning John Pilbin was at home with his wife Val.

(Jon and Val Pilbin in their kitchen)

JON PILBIN, MARK NEWTON AND PETER TRUONG'S NEIGHBOUR: It started off quite unusual actually when a policeman walks up to your front door and knocks on it and says "do you know your neighbours?" I said yeah. And then they just say to us well we're in there looking around, don't answer your phone, don't reply to them, don't do anything.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Val Pilbin went next door, to see what was happening.

IAN WELLS: She said "oh what's going on, can I help?" And she advised us well look they're overseas, and I said oh I see all the cameras, what's the go there? "Well they can access those cameras from overseas where they are remotely."

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Ian Wells and his team cut the power, disconnecting the computer servers, shutting down the surveillance cameras.

(Sound of phone ringing)

A few minutes later at Val and John Pilbin's, the phone started ringing. It was Peter Truong.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: He was panicking?

VAL PILBIN, MARK NEWTON AND PETER TRUONG'S NEIGHBOUR: Oh definitely. That panic was set in his voice when he was on the landline to me 'cause he was paranoid that he couldn't get to his computer, he couldn't access the internet.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Inside the house police found several digital cameras, photo travel books, and Adam's old passport - full by the time he was three years old.

Nine hard drives, four computers, and multiple storage devices were seized. But almost all of them were encrypted.

IAN WELLS: It wasn't until about probably the seven or eight hour mark that we had our eureka moment.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Taped inside a series of American history books were negatives of child pornography. It wasn't Adam. It was a teenage boy.

IAN WELLS: And we took fingerprints and, you know, I think it was a day or so later it was linked back to Peter Truong.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What was?

IAN WELLS: The negatives, the fingerprints on the negatives were tied back to Peter Truong.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: For Taskforce Argos, it was enough evidence to act. Jon Rouse called on the LAPD.

JON ROUSE: Surveillance was commenced. They identified the place of residence that they were staying at.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: They were staying an hour's drive from Los Angeles with Mark Newton's aunt, opposite a school, in Lakewood California.

Truong and Newton were handcuffed and taken away for questioning.

JON ROUSE: Ah, look there was basically denial. They maintained their right to remain silent, didn't answer any questions.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Police didn't find Adam in the house. He was being driven to Santa Monica Pier by a friend of Truong and Newton's.

In downtown LA, police set up a roadblock, their car was stopped and Adam taken into care.

JON ROUSE: Apart from, not presenting as a really normal child he was, on certain questions he withdrew completely. You know, he would hide, he wouldn't look at the interviewer so, we...

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What were those questions?

JON ROUSE: Just in terms of people in his life and his parents and, um, you know, had anything happened to him and, you know, I, I believe one of his responses was that he didn't want to get them into trouble.

(Home video of Adam practising basketball)

MARK NEWTON: Wow nice throw.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Using mock forensic interviews, Truong and Newton had schooled Adam to remain silent.

Taskforce Argos had no evidence that Adam was being abused. The police had no choice but to release Truong and Newton.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: So what did you do?

JON ROUSE: From this end, we started going very methodically through everything that we had seized, so all of the video, all of the photographs.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Inside the Victim Identification Unit, Paul Griffiths trawled through the only hard drive that wasn't encrypted, creating a timeline of their life since 2004. A life of prolific travel in pictures, 30 countries in six years, meeting unidentified men.

PAUL GRIFFITHS: Um initially we didn't know who any of the people they were meeting with were really. We started to piece together information, we listened sound on the videos, we looked at photographs, we examined locations.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: In amongst the thousands of images and the hours of videos did you find anything of the nature of child pornography, anything that would make an offence?

PAUL GRIFFITHS: There was nothing illegal in any of those images that we had access to on the unencrypted drives, no

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Upstairs, digital forensic analyst Leo Wyszynski was trying to crack the six encrypted drives.

[Talking to Leo Wyszynski] Basically what you were doing here is you were feeding lots of names, numbers, letters, passwords, to try and get in?

LEO WYSZYNSKI, COMPUTER FORENSIC ANALYST, QLD POLICE: Yes, that's right.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: And you couldn't get in?

LEO WYSZYNSKI: No.

CARO-MELDRUM-HANNA: You're working against the clock here because their son, Adam, he, he could be released back into their custody.

JON ROUSE: Absolutely.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: You needed to find something.

JON ROUSE: Absolutely.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: The strongest lead for Taskforce Argos: Truong and Newton's most recent travel videos and photos, dated April 2011, showing Adam getting a henna tattoo at a zoo in North Carolina.

(Home video of Peter Truong with a cake and talking to camera)

PETER TRUONG: We just got back, it's been a long day, look what I made isn't that lovely?

MARK NEWTON: Very nice.

PETER TRUONG: Hi dragon!

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: A video of an outing in San Francisco with two unidentified American men.

(Peter Truong showing Adam the cakes)

PETER TRUONG: Aren't they beautiful? They're so good aren't they?

(Truong falls over and drops cakes)

MAN: Oh no.

ADAM: Daddy!

(Home video of Adam playing in a hotel bedroom)

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: A few days later Adam plays in a hotel bedroom, his father, Peter Truong, recording.

ADAM: Big waves!

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: His henna tattoo is fading.

PETER TRUONG: Was that fun Roughie?

ADAM: Yes but there's terrible big waves.

PETER TRUONG: Oh no, I'll have to hold on then.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Taskforce Argos didn't know it at the time, but the evidence they desperately needed was staring them in the face.

The dots were about to join up.

Inside the Department of Justice in Washington Inspector Brian Bone was focussed on his investigation into Tail of the Dragon.

He was heading to his office when he overheard a conference call about an Australian investigation led by Taskforce Argos.

BRIAN BONE: Yeah and it's one of the needle in the haystack moments.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Brian Bone asked to see some photos of the boy that Taskforce Argos believed was being abused.

He saw the boy he'd been searching for. It was the boy in the video being abused by Tail of the Dragon members John Rex Powell and Jason Bettuo.

The boy with the mole on his stomach, and the henna tattoo on his chest.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: What matched them up?

JON ROUSE: Ah, the, I think the, the dead set immediate giveaway was the tattoo. You know, there's a, a henna tattoo, very, very particular. You put it all together, it's definitely our boy. Jubilation, relief, um, look, every human emotion you can possibly describe happened amongst this entire team because that was it, case closed.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: In February 2012, Mark Newton and Peter Truong were arrested and brought to Indiana to be prosecuted. They both pled guilty and awaited sentencing.

Separated from his partner and cut off from his network, Peter Truong started talking.

BRIAN BONE: He explained a lot of the circumstances. He was actually able to, we had the canvas, we had the frame and he was actually able to paint a lot of the stuff that we might not have ever known as to exactly this, what had occurred.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Faced with a possible life sentence, Peter Truong made a stunning decision.

He handed over the passwords to all of the encrypted drives, allowing forensic investigators in to their highly secret world. Helping police track down more offenders and their victims.

Inside, investigators discovered just how big the network was - bigger than they ever thought.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: [Talking to Paul Griffiths as they look at the hard drive information] Have you seen anything like this before?

PAUL GRIFFITHS: Not in such a volume in terms of this kind of material I would say, no.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Their obsession was young boys, and their collection spanned two decades. Adam was their star.

[Talking to Paul Griffiths] There's one there very private.

PAUL GRIFFITHS: I know, which is where we find the photographs of Adam, there's images from around the world yeah.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: And how old is he?

PAUL GRIFFITHS: Certainly younger than two years old.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: In Indianapolis Assistant US Attorney Steve DeBrota went through all the evidence.

STEVE DEBROTA: We're talking about sexual intercourse, oral, anal sexual intercourse from about age twenty months forward to when the victimisation stopped.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: He watched more than 80 hours of Adam being abused.

In one month alone, when Adam was five-years-old, Newton filmed himself having sex with his son on more than 12 different occasions.

Adam was also filmed with multiple men around the world.

STEVE DEBROTA: In one case we heard, we found Mr Newton's voice instructing someone in the room with Adam not to be disrespectful to the person in the room at a period in time when that adult is molesting Adam and...

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: How was Adam being disrespectful?

STEVE DEBROTA: Ah Adam you could tell from the video wasn't interested in doing the sexual activity in question. He wanted to just play.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: So far eight men have been identified abusing Adam. All organised by Truong and Newton - whose travel expenses were often paid for by the men who exploited their son.

[Talking to Steve DeBrota] What would be the deal that Peter Truong and Mark Newton would strike?

STEVE DEBROTA: It's actually kind of pathetic. They're really not getting paid. There's no financial motive here. Adam will be involved in sexual activity with men, not for money, but to just do it. Probably for the rationalisation of it, for the status of it, for the fantasy of it, all of that.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: In December 2013 Peter Truong was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

In court he said he was sorry.

STEVE DE BROTA: It's for others to judge whether you want to accept whether he's sorry that he did that stuff, that, or he's sorry that he got caught.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Well do you accept it?

STEVE DEBROTA: I think he's sorry he got caught.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter Truong is serving his 30 year sentence here at Marianna Correction Centre, north west of Florida. He arrived a few days ago.

He agreed to a television interview inside the centre but overnight the warden denied us access.

We've been told that Peter Truong is already a target here, his crimes have given him celebrity status, some inmates have asked to share his cell, others want to harm him.

There is a lot we wanted to ask Peter Truong. Why did he commit the crimes he did and what is he really sorry for?

ANGELYN GATES, PETER TRUONG'S ATTORNEY (ON PHONE): What about the medication, is your medication coming in?

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Defence attorney Angelyn Gates is speaking to her client Peter Truong. He calls her from prison almost every day.

She says Peter Truong has undergone a massive transformation.

ANGELYN GATES, CRIMINAL DEFENCE ATTORNEY: He's completely on the scale of 'It's wrong', all of it.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: That's a huge 180.

ANGELYN GATES: That's correct, hence the reason why he's gone through so much psychological trauma and suicide attempts.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Psychologist Robert Halon was the first doctor to assess Peter Truong in prison.

DR ROBERT HALON, PSYCHOLOGIST: He was in tremendous distress. Mean I don't think he stopped shaking the entire time and he was, he was like a child, just completely overwhelmed, scared out of his mind, worried about his son.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter Truong has given permission for Doctor Halon to talk to Four Corners about his case.

DR ROBERT HALON: The sense I got from everything he said was that essentially he had a very lonely, a lonely childhood.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter Truong and his family were Vietnamese refugees. They arrived in Australia when he was two-years-old.

Truong told Dr Halon he was molested by a relative from the age of nine.

DR ROBERT HALON: The way he describes it was a profoundly important one. He loves that person, that person gave him something he never got any other place. I'm not talking about the sex, but just the, the … an adult that he felt he could depend on; an adult that cared about him.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter's parents had another child, a son. And when Peter was 14 they bought him a computer.

ANGELYN GATES: At that point in time he started to show homosexual tendencies. So he would go to school and then he would come home and he would get on the internet with his new peers and be very comfortable and be very normal in that world.

DR ROBERT HALON: He started searching for validation. He started searching for answers to the questions that were increasing in his mind about himself and his sexuality.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Online, Peter Truong found the Man Boy Love network.

DR ROBERT HALON: Well they gradually got around to talking about how society doesn't understand children, because Peter was a child remember in these relationships with these men, and they... remember that their goal is to eventually be able to use Peter as a sex object.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Would this be a grooming process?

DOCTOR ROBERT HALON: Grooming par excellence. They're, they're are, they're finally tuned at it, highly skilled.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: When Peter Truong was 18 he left Australia to live in America and began a relationship with a man he met online. Robert Revay was in his fifties.

ANGELYN GATES: We call him the 'mentor'. This gentleman was encouraging and trying to indoctrinate him into the concept that now that he's an adult he's switching from the boy part of the man boy love to the man part of the man boy love.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Revay encouraged Peter Truong to start a relationship with a friend of his, another member of the Man Boy Love network, Mark Newton.

(Video of Mark Newton spinning a young boy, sound of laughter)

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: They travelled the world together, visiting orphanages, photographing themselves with boys.

They decided to have a child of their own.

[Talking to Angelyn Gates] Did Peter's mentor also encourage Peter to become a father?

ANGELYN GATES: Very much so, yes, he thought that Peter could be a good parent. He thought it would be a good idea and, every, basically everybody in the man boy love group from my understanding thought that it would, it, it would be a good idea.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: When Peter Truong was 28 he became a father.

DR ROBERT HALON: As the baby they adopted grew a little that then Mark began to mention that it would be a good thing for the child now to introduce that by a little touching and things like that.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter Truong said Mark Newton and Robert Revay, pictured here with Adam, convinced him that having sex with his son, and allowing other men to do the same, was ok.

Based on the conversations he had with Peter Truong, Dr Halon believes that he isn't a paedophile.

[Talking to Dr Halon] If Peter Truong isn't a paedophile, what is he and who is he attracted to, because he engaged sexually with a child?

DR ROBERT HALON: From what I understand about Peter his, his sexual gratification comes from being with older men, good looking men, strong men who, who take charge and I really don't have a sense that on his own he would ever be interested in a child sexually.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: And he explains his sexual interaction with children as?

DR ROBERT HALON: Make the children happy like Mark said and because Mark liked it.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Before we left Marianna, Florida, where Peter Truong is serving his sentence, we got a chance to speak with him, from a nearby hotel.

His attorney Angelyn Gates was also on the phone.

PETER TRUONG: Hi everybody.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: (on the phone with Peter) Hi, Peter.

Peter Truong told us that he too is a victim - indoctrinated by members of the Man Boy Love network when he was 16.

PETER TRUONG: Their philosophy was that, that children are sexual beings and that it's not wrong for adults, adult men to have sex with and have relationships with young boys, um and they . . .

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: And did you accept that? Did you agree?

PETER TRUONG: I did. I did. They were very convincing, to be honest with you. You know, they pointed me to different psychological studies, different books, different articles, and they even pointed me to history, you know, so all this happened in history, it's the right thing, it's not bad, it's, it's what they want, it's good for them. And this was drummed into my head, and eventually they had me go out and start helping them find victims and then find you know certain types of material such as child pornography to satisfy them.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: He said he was sorry.

PETER TRUONG: I'm locked up with a lot of predators here who have gone out and raped and done a lot of very bad things to children, and that's, that's just not me. You know, I'm not a predator. I'm not a deviant person by nature as such.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Peter, you say you're not a deviant. But we understand that you began to commit sexual acts with your son when he was very young, and..

ANGELYN GATES: No, we can't go into that. We're not going into that.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Can, can I ask you then, Peter, about you know, how that happened, how that happened with your partner?

ANGELYN GATES: No, we're not going, we're not going into that either.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Do you want to say anything? Because you've said you're sorry. Do you want to explain how that happened if you were led to that?

ANGELYN GATES: He explained.

PETER TRUONG: Angelyn, this is making me really uncomfortable.

ANGELYN GATES: Yeah, I know that. That's why we're not doing this. We're not going to, we're not, we're not going-

PETER TRUONG: They're coming at...they're really...they sound just like they're just trying to plaster me as a monster. I don't want this.

ANGELYN GATES: That's fine. Okay. That's fine, you can hang up.

PETER TRUONG: Okay, I'm going to hang up, I'm going to go.

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: Over.

We didn't speak to Peter Truong again. He will remain behind bars. His future has been determined.

But what of his son Adam, who's now nine years old and in the care of relatives?

(Home video of Adam on an Easter egg hunt with Mark Newton)

MARK NEWTON: Ah-ha!

CARO MELDRUM-HANNA: This is one of the last videos recorded with his parents - Easter morning, in America.

ADAM: This is the bestest day ever! I mean I have a whole bunch of toys.

CARO MELDRUM HANNA: He, he'll have the longest journey ahead of him?

IAN WELLS: Absolutely, look my understanding is he's being inundated with support and help, I don't know, we're dealing with someone who's really scarred, we, we're dealing with behaviour and traits and personality that was, written into his DNA from birth and to shake that I think it's going to be a, a long hard battle.

KERRY O'BRIEN: Peter Truong's partner Mark Newton was sentenced to 40 years jail elsewhere in the United States for his part in the conspiracy.

There's a footnote to tonight's story, it's worth observing that it does not reflect on gay parenting but on the action of two individuals, it's also worth remembering that most child sex offenders relate to crimes against young girls, not young boys and the predator is usually known to the family.

Next week on Four Corners, scrutiny on the intelligence operation that has Australia and East Timor squaring off over the billion dollar gas reserves in the Timor Sea.

Until then, good night.

END

Background Information

ABC NEWS COVERAGE

Child sex offender Peter Truong, jailed in Florida for abusing son, insists he is not a 'bad person' | ABC News | 10 Mar 2014 - Convicted child sex offender Peter Truong has told the ABC in an exclusive interview that he does not think he is a predator and that he misses his son. By Caro Meldrum-Hanna.

Australian paedophile Peter Truong jailed for 30 years in US after trafficking adopted son to Boy Lovers Network | ABC News | 10 Dec 2013 - A Queensland man who trafficked his adopted son to an international paedophile network has been sentenced to 30 years in jail by a US court.

Australian man jailed for 40 years in US after trafficking adopted son to global paedophile ring | ABC News | 30 Jun 2013 - An Australian man has been sentenced to 40 years in prison in the United States for trafficking his adopted son to a global paedophile network.

OPINION A journalist's second thoughts | The Drum | 10 Jul 2013 - In 2010 Ginger Gorman interviewed a gay couple about their struggle to become parents. When the men were uncovered as paedophiles Gorman was left with a deep sense of grief for the boy and questioned whether there was anything she could have done.

VIDEO Police vow to smash paedophile ring that abused boy trafficked by adoptive parents | ABC 7.30 | 3 Jul 2013 - Police have vowed to hunt down every member of an international paedophile network that sexually abused a boy who was trafficked by his adoptive parents. By Caro Meldrum-Hanna.

BACKGROUND

Child Sexual Assault: Facts and Statistics | Bravehearts | Dec 2012 - This document contains statistics and facts on child sexual assault that have been compiled by Bravehearts. [PDF 571Kb]

Child protection Australia 2011-12 | AIHW - Read the latest statistics on child abuse in Australia, compiled by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.

Online child sex exploitation | AFP - The AFP Child Protection Operations team performs an investigative and coordination role within Australia for multijurisdictional and international online child sex exploitation matters within the online and travel and tourism environments. Read more about Internet safety from the AFP.

Child sexual exploitation in travel and tourism | AFP - To protect children overseas, the Australian Government has created offences for this behaviour under the Commonwealth Criminal Code Act 1995.

CHILD SUPPORT AND REPORTING SERVICES

If you see child sexual abuse material online you can report it to the Australian Communications and Media Authority's Hotline using this online complaint form.

If you are concerned about an adult engaging in inappropriate behaviour with a child (whether online or not), or you suspect someone is accessing or distributing child sexual abuse material, call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or police on 000 (triple zero).

If you believe that a child is in IMMEDIATE danger, call the police on 000 (triple zero).

1800 Respect | 1800 737 732 - Are you experiencing sexual assault or domestic and family violence? Call the national counselling helpline for information and support. www.1800respect.org.au/

Adults Surviving Child Abuse | 1300 657 380 - Counselling and support for adult survivors of child abuse. Call between 9am-5pm Monday to Sunday. www.asca.org.au/

Bravehearts | | 1800 272 831 | @BraveheartsInc - Bravehearts' key purpose is to educate, empower and protect Australian kids from sexual assault. www.bravehearts.org.au/

Child Wise | 1800 991 099 | @Child_Wise - Australian-based charity fighting against child abuse and exploitation in Australia and internationally. Counselling provided. www.childwise.net/

Kids Helpline | 1800 55 1800 - Free, private and confidential, telephone and online counselling service specifically for young people aged between 5 and 25. www.kidshelpline.com.au/

Lifeline | 13 11 14 - 24-hour crisis support and suicide prevention. www.lifeline.org.au/

The Virtual Global Taskforce (VGT) seeks to build an effective, international partnership of law enforcement agencies, non government organisations and industry to help protect children from online child abuse. Find out more by visiting their website. http://www.virtualglobaltaskforce.com/