CHARLOTTETOWN — Four men, including a veteran member of the Charlottetown police force, were charged Monday with possession of child pornography.

The accused, including officer Clyde Sangster, 47, will appear in court in May to answer to the charges.

RCMP recovered 50,000 images of children, some as young as five years old, after seizing computers, CD-ROM's, downloaded material and books.

The arrests followed a six-month investigation into child exploitation on the Internet.

The accused were charged after raids on Island homes.

Charlottetown Police Chief Paul Smith called it a shocking and devastating situation for all members of the force.

"It's one of those things that no one wants to deal with, but we've shown when issues arose in the past, we are committed to deal with it and this is no different," he said.

RCMP Sgt. Kevin Baillie described some of the material collected as disturbing.

The Mounties said there will be more raids and arrests in the coming weeks.