Victoria Police played a key role in the arrest of 62-year-old Dr. Fred Janke, a family physician based in Sylvan Lake, Alberta, who has been charged with child exploitation offences.
The investigation was conducted in partnership with ALERT (Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams) Internet Child Exploitation (ICE) Unit, and dates back to October 2017.
That is when a Victoria Police officer started posing undercover as the parent of a five-year-old girl on a website that is known to be frequented by child sex offenders.
The officer in question was engaged in conversation with Janke which progressed to the suspect trying to arrange to have sex with the five-year-old girl.
Arrest and charges
Once the VicPD investigator determined that the perpetrator was located in Alberta, they contacted ALERT’s ICE Unit, and Janke was subsequently arrested in Edmonton on Thursday, June 28th.
Dr. Fred Janke is now facing charges of making arrangements to commit sexual offences against a child, making child pornography, and the distribution of child pornography.
He has been a practicing family physician in Alberta for almost 30 years. There is no information yet on whether or not he has a prior criminal record.
ALERT Communications Director, Mike Tucker, told Victoria Buzz that the website used by the perpetrator in question is unfortunately still active and has been under investigation by law enforcement agencies around the world for several years.
In a joint investigation with @vicpdcanada, ALERT's Internet Child Exploitation (ICE) Unit has arrested a Sylvan Lake family doctor and charged him with online child exploitation offences. More details at: https://t.co/gpZJL4jRaw #yeg #reddeer #sylvanlake pic.twitter.com/CCMP9KF2lu
— ALERT (@ALERT_AB) June 29, 2018