"Pedo Heaven" Kiddie-Porn Founder Maksym Shynkarenko Busted In "Most Successful" Child Smut Investigation In U.S. History

One of the world's prominent peddlers of child smut was extradited to New Jersey over the weekend where he currently faces multiple counts of kiddie-porn-related crimes following what authorities are calling "the most successful child pornography investigation in the nation's history."

The New Jersey U.S. Attorney's Office says a 32-count indictment was unsealed yesterday morning charging Maksym Shynkarenko -- a 33-year-old Ukrainian who allegedly operated a kiddie-porn website called "Pedo Heaven" -- with numerous child exploitation charges stemming from a lengthy investigation that has led to the convictions of more than 560 American consumers of (ahem) child erotica.

"According to the Indictment, Maksym Shynkarenko profited from the unspeakable abuse of thousands of innocent children by selling access to their suffering through his website," U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman says. "Distributors and consumers of child pornography create a market for sexual assaults on children, where the victimization of those children is refreshed with every download."

Federal prosecutors allege that between December 2003 and July 2008, Shynkarenko and others made "hundreds of thousands of dollars" by selling access to his kiddie-porn site to perverts around the world. The site had videos and images depicting the sexual abuse of children ranging from infants to teenagers.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents first discovered the site in October 2005, after seizing emails from the computer of a New Jersey man. When agents looked at the site, the banner page identified it as "Illegal.CP" (also known as "Pedo Heaven"). It featured more than a dozen images of minors engaged in sexual acts with other minors and adults, and proclaimed, "[n]ow you are in [sic] few minutes away from the best children porn site on the net!" and "[i]f you join this site you will get tons of uncensored forbidden pics . . . forbidden stories, and, of course, many videos."

The page also featured purported feedback from a self-described pedophile who praised the website. 

After discovering the website, an ICE agent posing as a pervert bought a 20-day subscription to the site. After registering, the agent got an email that provided a login name and password, as well as the assurance that credit card charges would appear on the subscriber's credit card bill as "ADSOFT."

The email also offered the following advice:

"Our site is considered to be illegal in all countries....Even if you ever have problems with police, you can always say that someone had stolen the information from your credit card and used it. It is very difficult to establish that you were the person to pay."

Federal agents continued to monitor the site and were able to identify hundreds of subscribers, whom, obviously, were arrested. No shocker here, but several of those arrested are convicted sex offenders, as well as "numerous others" who were actively molesting children.

In all, Shynkarenko faces one count of conspiracy to transport and ship child pornography; 16 counts of transportation and shipment of child pornography; one count of conspiracy to advertise child pornography; 12 counts of advertising child pornography; and one count each of engaging in a child exploitation enterprise and money laundering.