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4 May 2018
Top child psychiatrist and child protection expert convicted for child abuse photos and videos
By Jan Simonsen
A top participant in Norwegian child protection activities, Jo Erik Brøyn, 56 years old, had around 200,000 pictures illustrating sexual child abuse stored on his computer. Brøyn is a child psychiatrist.
The newspaper Aftenposten wrote back in 2010 that Jo Erik Brøyn (then 48) had become a father to twins by means of a surrogate mother in India.
He has for many years been an active, supporting participant in child protection in Oslo and the neighbouring county Akershus, carrying out evaluations of parents from whom the CPS (Barnevernet) intends to remove children. He has also until recently been a member of the national 'Child Expert Commission' (Barnesakkyndig Kommisjon).
Brøyn has now, on 23 April 2018, been sentenced to one year and 10 months of prison, having been found guilty of downloading, storing and sharing of enormous quantities of pictures and videos of children being subject to sexual abuse.
He has stored more than 4000 hours of illegal video material and about 200,000 illegal pictures. For almost 20 years, he downloaded abuse-pictures of children from the internet. According to ABC Nyheter, the well-known child psychiatrist was in possession of 205,536 computer files showing sexual abuse against children or sexualising children.
"The case is of large extent and has pictures and videos of crass character", police lawyer Jens Johannes Andenæs at the Oslo Police District office stated to ABC Nyheter before the court procedure started. According to Andenæs the accused has "largely" confessed to being guilty of the charges.
The indictment says, "Pictures and videos show e.g. sexual abuse committed by adults against children, sexual acts between children, and children performing sexual acts on themselves".
The newspaper Asker og Bærums Budstikke, based in two neighbouring municipalities to Oslo, in January wrote that the indicted child psychologist had carried out work for the child protection offices in a series of municipalities in eastern Norway, Bærum municipality among them.
As a psychiatrist and specialist on children he has delivered expert reports in hundreds of cases, leaving in his wake crying and broken-hearted parents who, because of his practically exceptionless support for Barnevernet, have lost what is most dear to them, their children. As early as before 2010 he had been reported to a black-list by an organisation critical to Barnevernet and listing psychiatrists and psychologists whom parents should try to keep out of their cases.
Jo Erik Brøyn was a member of the 'Child Expert Commission' right up to the time when he was suspended because the police charged him for the pictures of sexual child abuse. This commission is a central institution concerning child protection. It was established in 2010 and has as its task to scrutinise expert opinions asked for by Barnevernet, by the County Board (the first instance decision maker in care proceedings), by the courts or by private parties in child protection cases.
According to the newspaper VG he has been active in several debates about social issues and has given opinions in the media about children and psychiatry.
Brøyn has made excuses saying he has not passed the pictures on to others, only looked at them himself, which according to him made sure that nobody could be harmed by them. Save the Children does not agree. They have worked for several years to have politicians and the media stop using the term 'child pornography' and call them 'abuse pictures' instead. "To be in possession of such pictures contributes to maintaining a market which presupposes abuse of children. For the child, it is a new instance of abuse that the pictures are spread around. It is also serious because possession of abusive material can work to normalise abuse of children", says Line Hegna, director of communications in Norwegian Save the Children.
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En av to: OK med surrogati
Mer enn halvparten av den norske befolkningen mener det er greit å bruke surrogatmor for å få barn.
(One out of two: OK with surrogacy
More than half the Norwegian population think it is all right to use surrogate mothers to have children.)
Aftenposten, 23 October 2010 / updated 7 February 2018
Fant 193.000 overgrepsbilder hos barnepsykiater
(Found 193,000 pictures of abuse at a child psychiatrist's)
abc nyheter, 24 January 2018
Barnepsykiater med overgrepsbilder jobbet for barnevernet i Bærum
(Child psychiatrist with pictures of abuse worked for the CPS in Bærum municipality)
Asker og Bærum Budstikke, 29 January 2018
Oslo-psykiater tiltalt for oppbevaring av overgrepsmateriale: – Jeg har skammet meg veldig
(Oslo psychiatrist charged with storing abuse material: I have been very ashamed)
VG, 11 April 2018
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