The Canadian arm of the operation was "Project Spade", in Australia it was "Operation Thunderer". Investigations also spread to Greece, Ireland, New Zealand, and Norway. Īpart from Canada, Australia and the United States, authorities in Hong Kong, South Africa, Spain and Sweden were involved.
Way is alleged to have earned more than $4 million from his website. Investigations involved more than 50 countries. Postal Inspection Service recreated Way's customer records and shared them with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Interpol. Toronto law enforcement authorities and the U.S. In May 2011 Way's home and office were raided, and he was arrested. Sandra Ann Lauer was born in the German town of Saarbrücken, close to the French border.Following numerous complaints received by the website cybertip.ca about Azov Films, the investigation began in October 2010 when undercover police made online contact with Brian Way, a 42-year-old man from Toronto and the owner of Toronto-based Azov Films, a firm that distributed DVDs and streaming videos of naked children which it marketed as "naturist." Her father, Robert Lauer, who owned a wine store in Saarbrücken, is French and her mother, Karin ( née Eltern), who worked in a shoe store, is German. She also had an older brother, Gaston, a paraplegic who died in 1995. Sandra showed an early interest in music and dancing, starting to learn classical ballet at the age of 5, which she would continue for ten years, and receiving guitar lessons when she was 10 years old. In 1975, at the age of thirteen, Sandra went with her mother to see Young Star Festival, a Saarbrücken talent competition. She was only a member of the audience, but when all participants had finished performing and the jury was discussing the results, Sandra walked onto the stage, persuaded the DJ to put on the German version of a song made famous by Olivia Newton-John and started singing. The impromptu performance gained considerable recognition and led to the release of her first single, which was a children's song about a pet dog, 'Andy mein Freund'. The single, however, performed poorly on charts at that time dominated by disco mania. Sandra won international success in 1985 with a song '(I'll Never Be) Maria Magdalena', which topped the charts in 21 countries worldwide and reached top 10 in further five. Her first album, The Long Play (1985), reached number 12 in her home country of Germany and was a top 10 success in Scandinavia. The follow-up single, 'In the Heat of the Night', continued her international success, reaching number two in Germany and top 10 positions in many European countries. The song also earned Sandra second place at the Tokyo Music Festival in 1986. 'Little Girl' became the third single from the album in 1986, with the music video filmed in Venice, but met with moderate success. Shortly after the release of The Long Play, Sandra moved to London for six months, where she worked with singing instructor Helena Shelen and took drumming lessons to practice her timing. She also joined a language school, where she worked on her English skills, while she spent weekends in Munich recording new songs. Sandra and Michael married in January 1988 and relocated from Munich to the Spanish island Ibiza to work on what would be Sandra's third studio album. Into a Secret Land moved from electro-pop to more sophisticated areas of pop, what was showcased by the first single, 'Heaven Can Wait', a top 20 European hit. Second single, 'Secret Land', met with even greater success and is now considered one of Sandra's biggest hits while 'We'll Be Together', released as the third single to a big success, was the first song co-written by Sandra. In order to promote Sandra's music in th English-speaking world, another compilation was released at the end of 1988, Everlasting Love. The album failed to enter charts, but included a PWL remix of the title track which charted at number 45 in the UK. 1989 saw the release of the final single from Into a Secret Land, 'Around My Heart', which became another chart hit, while at that point the album itself was her best-selling offering. With animal rights and nature conservation high on her personal agenda, Sandra took part in recording a song 'Yes We Can' together with 15 other musicians as a part of the project Artists United for Nature. ġ999 saw the release of My Favourites, a double disc album featuring remixes of Sandra's older songs and some of her favourite ballads. It was a success, charting within the top 20 in some European countries.