SALT LAKE CITY — A week-long blitz conducted by more than two dozen federal and local agencies resulted in the arrests of 19 suspects accused of crimes related to child sexual abuse.
In addition to the individuals arrested, six Utah victims of Child Sexual Abuse of Exploitation Material were identified and or rescued.
The Attorney General's Office said the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force served 18 residential search warrants and investigated 19 separate cases in the blitz.
Search warrants were served in Provo, Orem, Holladay, Sandy, Smithfield, Salt Lake City, Taylorsville, Roosevelt, Brigham City, Ogden, Grantsville, West Valley, Murray and Lehi, officials said.
"We literally save kids and then we see the fruits of our labor,” said Supervisory Special Agent Sete Aulai in a press release. “You have the feds here, the local PD, the counties, the state, we're all here for this one common cause."
In addition to the arrests, more than 130 digital storage devices were seized and agents previewed more than 53 Terabytes of data during the blitz, officials reported.
More than 100 agents and 35 federal and local agencies came together to conduct the blitz and serve search warrants throughout the week.
