(The Center Square) – Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill revealed on Monday that a statewide operation resulted in the arrests of 60 sex offenders, many of whom were already registered offenders with prior convictions.
One man was arrested on 77 counts of possessing child pornography-related material. Another was arrested on 64 counts. Murrill told The Center Square that one sting led to the arrest of a man who was “actively committing first-degree rape against a child under the age of 13.”
Murrill was joined by law enforcement from nine other parishes and several district attorneys, though the operation is a statewide effort with more than 80 partnering parishes and sheriffs offices.
Murrill has made a concerted effort to crack down on child sexual abuse not just throughout the state but across the country as well. She said she has made recent trips to Washington, D.C., and will next week participate in a panel in Las Vegas.
Murrill has not been shy about calling out the applications, websites and video game companies where predators find their victims. She backed Louisiana’s 2023 social media age-verification law, and lawmakers followed in 2024 with Act 656, which delayed that law’s effective date while adding restrictions on targeted advertising and the sale of minors’ sensitive personal data by large social media platforms.
But those laws are under active litigation, Murrill said.
The official term used by law enforcement to describe the crimes is child sexual abuse material, or CSAM.
In an October criminal complaint filed in Louisiana’s Eastern District Court, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children provided a tip to the Louisiana Bureau of Investigation that led to the arrest of a New Orleans man who allegedly had 40 child pornography images.
The indictment describes three images, including one depicting sexual abuse of a prepubescent boy by an adult male.
Murrill said many of the offenders arrested were already barred from using social media because of prior sex crime convictions, raising questions about why major platforms are not doing more to screen them out.
“These are people who are already registered sex offenders,” Murrill said in an interview, adding that many are not necessarily hiding behind fake names.
She said social media companies could compare users against public sex offender databases but lack the incentive to do so without stronger accountability.
“They have ways to check,” Murrill said. “They just don’t have the motivation to do it.”
Murrill said she does not believe platforms will take the problem seriously until they face financial consequences.
“They make too much money to care,” Murrill said, arguing that law enforcement is left “picking up their collateral damage.”
In August 2024, French authorities arrested Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov at an airport outside Paris as part of an investigation into alleged criminal activity on the platform, including child sexual abuse material, drug trafficking and fraud.
Murrill said she would “100%” do the same.
In August 2025, Murrill announced a lawsuit against the gaming platform Roblox, alleging it lowered protection standards in order to attract more users. Roblox denied wrongdoing, calling any assertion that it would intentionally put users at risk “simply untrue.” She said that this latest operation uncovered predators on Fortnite, the PlayStation Network, Reddit, Discord, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram and more.
The latest round of arrests was concentrated in the greater Baton Rouge area, and Murrill said that the operation will continue to move throughout the state.
Through May 10, Louisiana had received nearly 27,000 cyber tips, approaching the more than 31,000 received during all of 2025. So far this year, the ICAC Task Force and Cyber Crime Unit have made 292 arrests, identified 36 child victims and rescued 32 children from ongoing abuse, officials said.
