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On Monday, authorities arrested Bart Huskey of LaFayette on charges of child molestation and trafficking child pornography over the Internet.
According to prosecutors, the images Huskey was posting vividly portrayed his repeated rape of a young girl over the span of several years.
According to the affidavit detailing the charges against Huskey, authorities were able to identify and locate him through some unbelievable detective work using the very images he posted online.
Computer forensic examiner Dawn Ego of the Maine State Police computer crimes unit is being credited for the arrest of Huskey.
Ego detailed how she became involved in the search for this alleged child rapist.
“How this all started for us is that it’s my understanding that the FBI had been working on this and they had kind of come to a standstill,” Ego said. “So they submitted a flier they had created requesting assistance from area law enforcement. My sergeant happened to come across the flier and got really interested it and got motivated to help this young girl.”
Ego talked about her search that led to the eventual arrest of Huskey.
“How this started for us is my sergeant recognized a bow that was hanging on the wall in some of the still images where the victim was seen being sexually abused,” Ego said.
The bow Ego described was a common bow used to announce the birth of a child.
“There was nothing special or unique about this bow. It just said ‘It’s a boy’ on it. At that point, I was able to find the manufacturer of that bow and get a customer list of all the states that the bow was sold to. That then limited our search down to 17 states. We started with 50 states but were able to limit that number to 17, the majority of which, were in the Southeast.”
Ego said the manufacturer of the bow only sold to hospital gift shops.
“Once I was able to get a listing of all those gift shops in those 17 states where it was sold, I was then able to limit my search to 50 hospitals in the region,” Ego said.
Next, Ego said, she received information from the FBI that some of the assaults against the victim may have occurred in a 2003-2005 sunburst orange Chevrolet Aztec vehicle.
“At that point, we started to run off-line searches for all sunburst orange Aztecs in the 17 states that the bow had been found in,’ Ego said.
Ego said that local Departments of Motor Vehicles were slow in granting their request for names of owners of such vehicles.
“We contacted all of our affiliate state computer crimes divisions,” Ego said. “We are able to contact them in the 17 states where the bow was found and everyone was more than helpful in taking this own. They contacted registered owners of orange Aztecs in their states and then made arrangements to interview them. We had affiliates who were calling us letting us know they were driving all over their states trying to find all the registered owners. They did an awesome job.”
But Ego admitted that this process was slow in producing the results she wanted.
“So we started back again analyzing some of the still pictures and also some of movies where the victim was seen,” Ego said. “In one of the movies and a picture, I noticed it was taken in a hotel room.”
Ego explained there was nothing really special about the hotel room, so she began examining the only thing of detail in the room, the bedding and drapes.
“I was able to learn of the fabric used in the bedding and also the drapes,” Ego said. “I was able to find the manufacturer of the fabric and was able to get their customer list of who they sold the fabric to, assemble the finished bedding and drapes. I was then able to get a customer list of who they sold these final pieces to.”
Ego said that her search of the fabric lead her to a particular hotel in Georgia, one of the 17 states to which her investigation had focused.
“I was able to make contact with the manager of the hotel who, in turn, was able to provide me with a customer for one of the dates of the movies that was posted,” Ego said. “Although the customer wasn’t driving the orange Aztec we were looking for, I recalled an image of a white van that the FBI had reported might possibly be involved as well. The manager was able to identify the van. She was then able to describe what the suspect looked like from the driver’s license information.”
Ego said she knew at that point she had found the identity of the man who was responsible for the assault against the young girl that was posted in movies and in still pictures on the Internet, Bart Huskey.
“I knew we had the guy,” Ego said. “I reported his name and his date of birth and his address to the FBI and my sergeant here, and that led to the arrest.”
Ego credited the arrest of Huskey to all those involved in her investigation.
“I want to commend all the people in the process that we spoke to,” Ego said. “Not only law enforcement but just the general day-to-day people. They really went out of their way. They got motivated. They placed telephone calls independently without us even asking them. They really went out of their way to try to save this young girl. Also in terms of the company identifying the fabric, they really know their stuff and they did everything they could to help this little girl.”
Bart Huskey is being held in Atlanta by federal authorities. He has a court appearance Monday to determine whether he will receive bond.
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