A predator posing as a famous teenage YouTuber who blackmailed hundreds of girls around the globe into performing sex acts on camera has been jailed for 17 years in Australia.
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00:00A predator posing as a famous teenage YouTuber who blackmailed hundreds of girls around the
00:04globe into performing sex acts on camera has been jailed for 17 years in Australia.
00:10Mohammad Zain ul-Abidin Rashid pleaded guilty to 119 charges, relating to 286 people from 20
00:18countries, including the UK, the US, Japan and France. Two-thirds of his victims were aged under
00:2516. A Perth court heard the 29-year-old coerced them into a cycle of increasingly extreme abuse
00:31by threatening to send explicit messages and images of them to their loved ones.
00:36Australian authorities say it is one of the worst sextortion cases in history.
00:42The callous disregard this man had for his victims around the world and their distress,
00:47humiliation and fear make it one of the most horrific sextortion cases prosecuted in Australia,
00:53said Australian Federal Police Assistant Commissioner David McLean.
00:57This type of online exploitation and abuse is devastating and causes lifelong trauma.
01:03When handing down her sentence on Tuesday, Judge Amanda Burroughs said Rashid's offence was of
01:09such magnitude there was, no comparable case, in the country, according to the Australian
01:14Broadcasting Corporation, ABC. Pretending to be a 15-year-old American internet star,
01:20Rashid would strike up a conversation with his targets before involving them in discussions about
01:26sexual fantasies. He threatened to send their responses to friends and family unless they
01:31performed a series of escalating, degrading, sex acts, which at times included family pets and
01:37other children in their home. The court heard Rashid had been involved in misogynistic,
01:43insult, communities online, and on several occasions had invited other people,
01:48in one case as many as 98 to watch the distressing acts on a livestream.
01:53Many of the children being extorted told him they were suicidal, one even sent images of self-harm.
01:59But Rashid continued his blackmail despite their
02:03obvious distress and, extreme fear, the judge said, according to the ABC.
02:09He was caught after Australian authorities were contacted by Interpol and US investigators
02:14and charged in 2020 after a police raid on his home. Rashid is already serving a five-year
02:21prison term for sexually abusing a 14-year-old twice in his car at a Perth park. The court heard
02:27he was engaged in a sex offenders treatment program but Rashid still represented a high
02:32risk of reoffending. He will be eligible to apply for parole in August 2033.