The man sextorted these girls, convincing them to send him sexual images and then using those images to extort them.
A 33-year-old man from Ridderkerk is accused of the online sexual abuse of at least 20 girls. According to the Public Prosecution Service (OM), the man sextorted these girls, convincing them to send him sexual images and then using those images to extort them. The OM recommended that the court sentence the man to 3.5 years in prison, 6 months of which are to be conditionally suspended.
The case came to light in 2023, when the mother of one of the victims went to the police. According to Rijnmond, this victim was 11 years old. All the victims are young, between 11 and 16, the broadcaster wrote.
The OM charged the Ridderkek man with eight crimes, including producing and possessing child sexual abuse images, sexual assault, indecent acts, seducing children to indecent acts online, and penetrating a child. In two cases, he physically met up with his victims, and in one case, he raped her.
According to the OM, the man almost always used the same method to target the children. Using false names, he made contact with the girls on social media channels like Snapchat and slowly worked to gain their trust. He complemented them and was kind to them, and then, often by offering them money, persuaded the children to make and send him sexual photos and videos. He also frequently sent sexual photos of himself to the girls. Once had the girls under his control, he forced them to continue sending him photos and videos by threatening to publish the ones he already had.
The authorities found a large number of photos and videos on various data carriers seized from the man. These included images of the 20 girls in this case. There were also images of other girls, who the police have not been able to identify yet.
“It was a very frightening time for many child victims in this case. They felt foolish, were under pressure, and saw no way out at that moment. They didn’t dare tell, out of shame and fear,” the prosecutor said in court. “Many girls still struggle with feelings of shame, inferiority, sadness, and anger about what he did to them. Many of them had to seek professional help to process these terrible experiences.”
The suspect has largely confessed to his crimes. Though in court he argued that he didn’t realize his victims were under the age of 18. “You don’t have profile pictures on Snapchat, and I didn’t see her head in the photos,” the man said in the court in Dordrecht, Rijnmond reported. The judge found that hard to believe, pointing out that someone’s face is not the only indication that they are a child. “For you, a 30-year-old, that must have been a huge red flag,” the judge said.
The court will rule on December 9.
Sextortion has long been a growing problem in the Netherlands and beyond. In May, a survey by the victim support organization Slachtofferhulp revealed that an alarming half of teenagers and young adults aged 12 to 25 have been subjected to online sexual abuse, including sextortion and grooming.
New forms of sextortion are also on the rise, including criminal sextortion. Like with “classic” sextortion, victims are blackmailed with nude images of themselves, but instead of wanting money, the perpetrators force the victims to commit a crime. Recent investigations also revealed that groups in the sadistic Com movement, such as the 764 and No Lives Matter groups, are recruiting children on the gaming platform Roblox or social media and then using sextortion, among other things, to force the children to harm themselves or others.
