Austria:The Garda was not the only police force caught out when Austrian police revealed last week that they had cracked a child pornography ring involving more than 2,300 computer users in 77 countries.
Police in Germany, Denmark and Sweden have all complained publicly that, by going public last week, the Austrians have reduced their chances of successfully completing investigations.
Last week's revelation that two Irish computers had accessed material of children as young as five being abused caught gardaí unawares. Initially they denied the Austrians had contacted them, then expressed regret and opened an investigation after it emerged that officers had overlooked the report when it arrived last August.
In contrast, police in Copenhagen say they opened investigations immediately after receiving the information from Vienna that 19 Danish computers were involved. But Danish officer Hans Henrik Jensen told Austria's Der Standardnewspaper that officers had left the child pornography files untouched while they pursued "thousands of open cases" considered more urgent.
Mr Jensen said it was now unlikely that they would be able to complete all investigations because the Austrians went public with their coup. It was a similar situation in neighbouring Sweden, where some 50 internet protocol addresses were located. Investigator Sten Warmland declined to say whether Swedish investigations had been hampered. However, he said he had "a certain understanding" of the Danes' annoyance.
It was a similar situation in Germany, where police admitted they had yet to follow up all of the 406 cases given to them by their Austrian colleagues. Leading police officers in Baden Württemberg - where 26 suspects were located - told the Stuttgarter Zeitungnewspaper that it made little sense to continue their investigations after the Austrians went public with details of the ring. "We almost fainted when we read that," said one unnamed officer to the newspaper.
Austrian police rejected criticism from their European colleagues yesterday, suggesting it was not their press conference but sloppy police work that had caused these problems. "They had more than six months to investigate this," said Gerald Hesztera, an Austrian federal police spokesman.