The U.S. Department of Justice announced the rescue of 115 child exploitation victims and the arrest of 205 child sexual abuse offenders in Operation Restore Justice on Wednesday.
Three offenders, including a K-sixth grade public charter school director, were apprehended in Utah.
Attorney General Pam Bondi and Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Kash Patel released the operation report at a press conference in Washington.
“These depraved human beings, if convicted, will face the maximum penalty in prison, some life,” Bondi said. “We will find you, we will arrest you, and we will charge you. If you are online, targeting a child, you will not escape us. The FBI and the Department of Justice will come after you, and we will prosecute you.”
The nationwide effort involved all 55 FBI field offices, the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section in the Department‘s Criminal Division, and United States Attorney’s Offices around the country.
Patel added that the tireless and mentally demanding job of removing child predators from American society, done collaboratively by attorneys, agents, and other law enforcement, “is some of the harshest criminality we’ve ever seen.”
“People in places of public trust have violated not only the law, but that public trust,” Patel said. The arrests included “teachers, law enforcement personnel, and other professionals that we look to safeguard our children, have not only violated the law but violated the trust,” emphasizing that the mission of the Trump administration is clear to child predators:
“You will be hunted down and you will be prosecuted,” he said, “And that is a refreshing thing to hear for the men and women who do this work tirelessly, and it‘s also an acknowledgement of the safety that we look forward to bringing America.”
Child exploitation in Utah
Supervisory Special Agent Dustin Grant, who oversees Utah’s FBI Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force, said every day is a fire, but that‘s a good thing.
“Our work is spent trying to find offenders on the internet who are targeting children, either in a trafficking scenario or a sexual exploitation scenario, and identifying them, disrupting the groups and trying to bring justice for our victims that we find here in Utah,” he told a room of reporters at the FBI’s Salt Lake City headquarters on Wednesday.
In Operation Restore Justice, three people in Utah were identified as alleged child sexual abusers:
- Gustavo Uroza-Rodriguez, charged on April 23, with attempted coercion and enticement, distribution of child pornography, and possession of child pornography.
- Melissa Goodrich, charged on April 23, with trafficking of a minor.
- Jared Buckley, charged on April 23, 2025, with possession of child sexual abuse material.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah, Buckley was the lead director of the Leadership Learning Academy campuses in Layton and Ogden, Utah, a charter school for grades kindergarten through sixth grade, until his arrest.
During the forensic operation of Buckley’s belongings, “agents found well over 10,000 images and videos of child sexual abuse material. The forensic examination of the cell phone also revealed evidence that Buckley has been distributing images of child sexual abuse material across multiple on-line platforms.”
Online is where Grant said the majority of abusers go to prey on children; most offenders of Utah victims don’t even live in the state, he noted. When it comes to Utah, based on state population, the amount of cases seems “on par” compared to other states.
“We do have offenders that are in Utah, but they’re not just targeting victims” in Utah, but possibly in other states, because they can’t just do it from the internet, Grant added. “That‘s where we’re trying to engage in our online undercover techniques, and trying to disrupt a lot of that behavior, to identify victims before the behavior gets worse, and also maybe make a stop to some of these guys who are more prolific in what they’re doing on the internet.”
A harrowing trend his team is seeing in Utah is “sextortion,” where a minor will believe they are in conversation with someone of a similar age who is interested in pursuing a relationship with them, but is actually an adult posing as a young person.
The abuser will then coerce them into sharing sexually explicit materials of themselves, which they will then use against the child to exploit money.
“So financial, sexually motivated crimes. Largely boys that are being targeted. That‘s the bulk of what we handle lately,” Grant said. Though it‘s a national issue, “I would say here in Utah, that‘s a trend that we’re seeing upwards throughout the last few years (and) is something I’ve seen personally.”
What can parents do?
Grant said it shouldn’t come as much of a shock that the majority of interactions between child victims and adult predators are occurring on the most popular social media platforms, like TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat and even gaming platforms.
“I think if you know your kid very well, there’s going to be obvious behaviors that will be concerning to you,” Grant said. Still, just like with the concerns of your child going behind the wheel for the first time, social media is the same. “There’s inherent risks and dangers that are associated with that.”
But he cautioned parents to stay involved in what their child does on their phone and who they interact with. “We’re constantly engaging with school systems and parents on a yearly basis to make sure that these are the risks that you’re inherently creating when you give a kid a phone and allowing them to have social media.”
