After sentencing him to prison for child porn offences and luring a Filipino girl online, the judge wanted Joseph Moss to understand the exploitation of children won’t be tolerated here or anywhere else.
“The contemporary recognition throughout the world of the need to provide legal protection for children from harm, including from online sexual exploitation, is one of the few issues in the world that enjoys unanimous approval and recognition,” Ontario Court Justice Jason Miller wrote in his decision to sentence Moss, 41, to seven years, calling his crimes “extremely serious.”
“There is no philosophical disagreement about these issues in the world. It only exists in the distorted thinking of Mr. Moss.”
The London man pleaded guilty to five charges on Sept. 11 including possessing and distributing horrific images of child pornography and carrying on an online sexual relationship with a 12-year-old girl while sending money and gifts to her family in the Philippines.
In a lengthy, strange address at his guilty plea hearing, Moss told Miller he didn’t understand what he did wrong, given that the girl’s family accepted him and saw him as a future husband for one of their daughters. He was of the view the Philippines would be more tolerant.
“He believes the law is wrong, not that he did wrong,” the judge wrote.
Miller said Moss is wrong and pointed to the United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child and the protocol addressing child human trafficking, prostitution and pornography that was signed and ratified by more than 190 countries, including Canada and the Philippines.
All of Moss’s offences would be serious under Filipino law. Convictions for making child pornography alone would have led to a sentence of 12 to 20 years, Miller said.
In the spring of 2021, Moss shared child porn videos with an unidentified user on four different days using Facebook’s Messenger app. Through a search warrant, police seized Moss’s cellphone, laptop and external hard drive and discovered 2,002 unique images, 496 unique videos and 50 detailed written stories.
“The images spanned depravity standards,” Miller wrote, with some involving children as young as one and as old as 14. Many were of pre-pubescent children being sexually assaulted by adults and there was one example of bestiality.
“Each child in the images and photos is a real child whose life is forever harmed by the unimaginable abuse they suffered in the creation of the material,” the judge wrote, describing it as “cruel and inhumane.”
Investigators found hundreds of images and videos of the Filipino girl and her family. Moss sent them money for whatever they needed: food, cellphones, utilities, bedding, clothing and construction materials to fix their home.
It wasn’t clear how long Moss had been involved with the family, but Miller noted one of Moss’s long-term relationships ended after three years in 2019 when his partner found out about the family.
What was clear is the relationship with the girl had become alarmingly sexual. Miller pointed to a chat exchange when Moss was unsure if the girl loved him or just wanted his money. “You are not willing to do something difficult,” Moss wrote suggesting he would be able to trust her if they had sex.
In another exchange, the girl asked for food money which was only forwarded if the girl promised she would take her clothes off for him later. In other video chats, he begged her to remove her clothing, which she did, and instructed her what to do, showing her he was sexually aroused.
Miller called it “grooming.”
“To put it simply, Mr. Moss had clearly established in his mind and that of (the girl) a pay-to-play arrangement, in which his love and support was dependent on her complying with his sexual advances,” the judge wrote.
Miller took issue with letters of support that “speak of Mr. Moss in glowing terms” filed by Moss that he said were from the family. The judge was not shown originals, but only photos of the letters. Also troubling was a letter from Moss’s father that wasn’t dated or signed and had no contact number.
The family’s support “doesn’t attenuate Mr. Moss’s moral culpability or impact the seriousness of his offences,” Miller wrote.
Moss had no prior criminal record, but there were some alarming tendencies described in his pre-sentence report, including his view he couldn’t get a job at restaurants partially because he is “not brown” and blamed his inability to further his education on “international students.”
He sees nothing wrong with adult men having sexual relationships with young girls and “shows no insight into his criminal behaviour or its severity,” Miller wrote.
“Whatever the reason Mr. Moss decided to plead guilty, the evidence conclusively shows, in my mind, that he is not remorseful for his actions and continues to believe that there is nothing wrong with what he did,” the judge wrote.
Moss also said he didn’t know about the child porn found on what he said was a second-hand hard drive. Miller called the claim “totally absurd… it would be coincidence beyond coincidence that the suggested used hard drive sale containing unknown child pornography occurred at a time when Mr. Moss, unbeknownst to the seller, was engaged in an unlawful sexually deviant relationship with a 12-year-old and making child pornography of her.”
Miller wrote there is “a real and present danger that Mr. Moss will reoffend against children,” calling the risk “currently high.”
Moss’s plan to marry the victim or her sister and move to a country that accepts the sexual abuse of children “is as shocking as it is telling,” Miller wrote.
All of Moss’s crimes, Miller said are “gravely serious” and “Canadians find these offences morally repugnant (and) intolerable.”
The Crown had asked for eight years, while the defence asked for four to five years. Miller gave Moss some credit for his guilty pleas, which saved trial time. He also ordered Moss be banned for life from places and jobs involving children.