Legal action sought over Llanrwst video nasties

Sep 9 2010 by Samantha Castle, North Wales Weekly News

SICK videos wrongly accusing people of being involved in sex offences have been taken off a popular website but are now being featured on dozens more.

Last week the Weekly News revealed the shocking clips had appeared on YouTube with pictures of up to 200 people from Llanrwst saying they were paedophiles and sex offenders.

The Google-owned site quickly removed them but worried residents have now found them cropping up elsewhere on the internet – including hardcore porn sites.

People in Llanrwst remain furious at the videos, which show van drivers, dog walkers, tourists and locals going about their everyday business.

One resident caught up in the slur, John Court said the videos are still very much at large.

“These damaging videos are still totally available on the web, despite YouTube removing them you can still find hundreds of sites with them on, and they are spreading. I wonder if this will ever end for the innocent people like myself involved.

“I would like to know if it’s possible to take legal action against sites like YouTube to ensure they police themselves better because I don’t think they realise just what devastating impact these kind of videos can have on people: it shouldn’t be allowed and should be policed.”

Another concerned resident, whose daughter’s image appeared in one of the videos, said action had to be taken.

“It is terrible how these videos have been allowed to be freely uploaded and now they have spread beyond YouTube to the rest of the web. Something must be done to control this kind of behaviour.

“When my daughter discovered her image had been used she was distraught, beyond consolation, we did everything we could think of to try and rectify the situation.

“My daughter even had to set up her own YouTube account in order to ‘flag-up’ the videos as being offensive, before they were removed. It is ridiculous, and it’s not over: after a web search today we found the videos on a hard-core porn site.

“The police were helpless, despite being presented with evidence about the videos, even the police computer crime unit could not help.”

Anyone affected by the messages or with information can email police at Michael.Davies@northwales.pnn.police.uk