Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / 'ALL AMERICAN' TEEN STAR ATHLETE DEAD AFTER DEPRAVED 'SEXTORTION' SCAM

Transcript

'ALL AMERICAN' TEEN STAR ATHLETE DEAD AFTER DEPRAVED 'SEXTORTION' SCAM · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:00
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, an All American teen star
0:09
Speaker 1: athlete dead after a depraved sextortion scam.
0:15
Speaker 2: I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. I want to
0:17
Speaker 2: thank you for being with us.
0:19
Speaker 3: In Cross Lanes, West Virginia, fifteen year old Brice Tate
0:22
Speaker 3: explores social media like any teenager, unaware of the hidden
0:26
Speaker 3: dangers that threaten to isolate and endanger him.
0:30
Speaker 1: It's overwhelming, overwhelming to parents like me who have incredible
0:37
Speaker 1: scrubbed and sunshine all American teen children, to discover your
0:44
Speaker 1: child dead and then to learn is because of literally
0:49
Speaker 1: I had to look for the right word to describe
0:52
Speaker 1: this a depraved sextortion scheme.
0:56
Speaker 4: Listen, they'll go onto their social media accounts, gather their
1:00
Speaker 4: friends list, and that's who they tell them they're going
1:03
Speaker 4: to release to. So once you feel like the world's
1:05
Speaker 4: going to know what's going to happen, and you feel
1:07
Speaker 4: like you're you know, you have no other way to
1:09
Speaker 4: turn to. Unfortunately a lot of kids in this country
1:11
Speaker 4: take their own love. It is Detective Pain of the
1:14
Speaker 4: concae Shoft's office who did the forensic examination on the
1:16
Speaker 4: cell phone and was able to find that Bryce was
1:19
Speaker 4: going through a complicated ordeal called sex torsion.
1:23
Speaker 3: The seventeen year old girl texting Bryce quickly escalates. She
1:27
Speaker 3: sends Bryce racy photos and asks him to reciprocate. Afraid
1:30
Speaker 3: to lose her attention, Bryce eventually gives in to her request,
1:33
Speaker 3: and the script immediately flips. The texture, reveals themselves as
1:37
Speaker 3: a scammer, and threatens to send Bryce's explicit photos to
1:40
Speaker 3: everyone he knows unless Bryce pays five hundred dollars.
1:44
Speaker 1: It's just too much for a young teen, especially a
1:49
Speaker 1: very naive young teen.
1:52
Speaker 2: To take in. And now this boy, a boy is dead.
1:57
Speaker 1: You just heard chargeant Jeremy Burn speaking TOSAZ. Before I
2:01
Speaker 1: go straight out to our investigative journalist, Melissa McCarty, I
2:06
Speaker 1: want to go to a very special guest. Joining me
2:08
Speaker 1: is Jennifer Butta, the mother of Jordan to May, a
2:11
Speaker 1: victim of sex stortion. Jennifer, after all your crusading, after
2:17
Speaker 1: everything you have been through, it never ends, It never ends.
2:22
Speaker 1: When I heard this, you were the first person I thought.
2:25
Speaker 5: Of, Yeah, it just keeps happening to our children. When
2:30
Speaker 5: I heard about this case, I was very triggered by
2:33
Speaker 5: it because emotionally I have stood in those parents shoes.
2:36
Speaker 5: I'm still standing in them, and I'm angry that this
2:40
Speaker 5: continues to happen to our children. And when is enough
2:43
Speaker 5: going to be enough and someone will step in to
2:46
Speaker 5: prevent this from taking our kids' life.
2:48
Speaker 1: Jennifer, I want other parents and other teens to hear
2:53
Speaker 1: what you have to say after Jordan, your baby following
3:02
Speaker 1: literally a depraved sextortion scheme. That night at supper, I
3:07
Speaker 1: sat down with the twins and we talked. A little
3:10
Speaker 1: girl at their school had sent topless photos around, and
3:13
Speaker 1: of course, the one guy that got the photos sent
3:16
Speaker 1: them to everybody, and the little girl was totally shamed.
3:19
Speaker 1: And I said, guys, this happens. Sometimes you're talking to
3:23
Speaker 1: somebody and they'll want a picture of you and you
3:25
Speaker 1: send it. I've got to tell you about Jordan. And
3:29
Speaker 1: they were stunned and they didn't want to talk about it,
3:33
Speaker 1: but I told them about it, and I brought him
3:35
Speaker 1: up many times since then. Could you tell the viewers,
3:41
Speaker 1: parents like me and young teens what happened to Jordan.
3:49
Speaker 5: Jordan was contacted by an alleged female on social media,
3:54
Speaker 5: and after sending some messages back and forth regaining his trust,
4:00
Speaker 5: he thought he was talking to this beautiful young lady who.
4:05
Speaker 2: Had mutual friends with him.
4:08
Speaker 5: This person asked Jordan to send an explicit photo. Once
4:13
Speaker 5: he did, the whole script flipped and immediately they started
4:16
Speaker 5: demanding money from him. It started with one thousand dollars.
4:21
Speaker 5: He did eventually send them three hundred dollars, but it
4:24
Speaker 5: wasn't enough, and they kept putting the pressure on him
4:27
Speaker 5: for hours until he finally said I'm going to take
4:30
Speaker 5: my own life, and they encouraged it, saying we're going
4:34
Speaker 5: to watch you die a miserable death. And my son
4:36
Speaker 5: did take his own life within six hours.
4:39
Speaker 2: Now it has happened again. It has happened over and
4:43
Speaker 2: over and.
4:43
Speaker 1: Over, and I want you to see what this young
4:48
Speaker 1: boy's mom has left.
4:51
Speaker 2: Now, mommy's here.
4:55
Speaker 6: Look at your windmail.
4:55
Speaker 7: Go watch.
5:00
Speaker 8: Bunny, and you're texts onto. There's been a lot of snow.
5:05
Speaker 9: Buddy's son.
5:09
Speaker 1: I almost couldn't play that because that is Amanda and Idam,
5:15
Speaker 1: Amanda and Adam speaking to their boy just fifteen.
5:21
Speaker 2: In the snow at his grave. Listen.
5:26
Speaker 10: Bryce is Amanda and Adam Tate's only child and the
5:29
Speaker 10: apple of their eye. The fifteen year old is a
5:32
Speaker 10: sophomore at Nitral High School in Cross Lanes, a standout student,
5:36
Speaker 10: star basketball player, funny goofy, and a Christian Fellowship youth leader.
5:41
Speaker 10: When Bryce isn't in school, he's lifting weights at the gym,
5:44
Speaker 10: shooting hoops, or spending time with his loving family.
5:48
Speaker 1: Him in life, and then after this deadly depraved sextortion scam,
5:55
Speaker 1: he is dead and his mother and father visit him
5:59
Speaker 1: at the cemetery.
6:01
Speaker 3: On a Thursday afternoon, Bryce heads to the gym after school.
6:03
Speaker 3: If Bryce gets at the texture claims she's a junior
6:06
Speaker 3: at another high school and has seen Bryce at the
6:08
Speaker 3: gym before. She knows some of his friends who told
6:11
Speaker 3: her about his impressive basketball skills and wanted to introduce herself.
6:15
Speaker 3: The teens flirt back and forth all afternoon.
6:18
Speaker 11: Bryce comes home from the gym, still engrossed in his
6:20
Speaker 11: tanks conversation with the pretty stranger. Brynce has thrilled ats
6:24
Speaker 11: taco night and has plenty of appetite, happily chatting with
6:27
Speaker 11: his parents at the dinner table. After clearing the table,
6:30
Speaker 11: Bryce heads outside to shoose some hoops, but he's distracted
6:33
Speaker 11: by his new.
6:34
Speaker 1: Friend, Sidney Sumner. Crime Stories investigative reporter. What happened?
6:38
Speaker 12: Bryce Tate was texted by a beautiful seventeen year old
6:43
Speaker 12: girl who convinced him she went to a high school
6:47
Speaker 12: in town. She name drops his friends in this conversation,
6:51
Speaker 12: saying she knows them in passing. They've mentioned Bryce before,
6:56
Speaker 12: gave him gave his phone number to her because she
6:59
Speaker 12: was interested in maybe having a relationship with him at
7:03
Speaker 12: some point. So these teens have a conversation. They're flirting,
7:07
Speaker 12: she's escalating, and within three hours, this girl reveals herself
7:13
Speaker 12: as a scammer and wants five hundred dollars from Bryce
7:19
Speaker 12: to not send nude photos that he gave her to
7:23
Speaker 12: everyone he knows. And this fifteen year old boy, who
7:28
Speaker 12: only has thirty dollars in his bank account is pushed
7:31
Speaker 12: to suicide because they tell him they will ruin his life.
7:36
Speaker 10: Just after seven pm, Amanda and Adam Tait are shocked
7:40
Speaker 10: by the sound of a gunshot and rush into Adam's
7:43
Speaker 10: man cave. They're happy teenager shot himself. The hysterical parents
7:47
Speaker 10: call nine one one, but Bryce was gone the moment
7:50
Speaker 10: he pulled the trigger. What no one understands is why
7:53
Speaker 10: Bryce would take his own life.
7:55
Speaker 4: He is on November six that the parents of Bryce
7:58
Speaker 4: Tate had called nine one one because their son had
8:01
Speaker 4: taken his own life with a firearm.
8:03
Speaker 1: You were hearing, Sergeant Jeremy Burns from our friends at
8:05
Speaker 1: WHS to Tanya Jordan joining a special guest, the chief
8:10
Speaker 1: parent officer at Bark Parental.
8:13
Speaker 2: She's the author of parenting in a tech world.
8:15
Speaker 1: It's just too much for a teen that young to
8:19
Speaker 1: take in that if a naked photo of them or
8:24
Speaker 1: a body part of them goes out to their family
8:29
Speaker 1: or their friends, people at school, death would be better
8:34
Speaker 1: than that. They can't understand what's happening. But to Tanya,
8:39
Speaker 1: this is happening all over the country.
8:42
Speaker 2: This scammer, this scammer.
8:44
Speaker 1: That might as well have held a gun to this
8:47
Speaker 1: teen boy's head, had thousands and thousands of teen children,
8:53
Speaker 1: boys and girls that he was targeting.
8:58
Speaker 2: How does it happen? Explain to me how it happened.
9:00
Speaker 1: And I told my children right to their face, I've
9:03
Speaker 1: seen all your body parts since you were born. I
9:06
Speaker 1: don't care if I get a picture of your body part,
9:10
Speaker 1: don't care.
9:12
Speaker 2: This is what happened.
9:13
Speaker 1: To Jordan to make this is what happened to Bryce
9:16
Speaker 1: and I name out people their age and this has
9:20
Speaker 1: happened to but children that young to Tellia, they don't understand.
9:26
Speaker 13: Our brains are not fully formed until we're in our
9:29
Speaker 13: mid twenties, and so children are not capable because of
9:32
Speaker 13: their prefrontal cortex to make the right decisions all the time.
9:36
Speaker 13: They need to know that they can come to it
9:37
Speaker 13: at any time and let you know about bad things
9:40
Speaker 13: that have happened, and you're not going to smack the
9:43
Speaker 13: phone out of their hand or ground them for a year,
9:46
Speaker 13: because to your point, it is not better to die
9:49
Speaker 13: by suicide than to have to fess up to this
9:53
Speaker 13: shameful and embarrassing decision. It's also not their fault because
9:56
Speaker 13: they're being targeted. They're being targeted on Instagram, on TikTok,
10:01
Speaker 13: on text message, on roadblocks, on discord, YouTube, you name it.
10:06
Speaker 13: They're being targeted everywhere, and they think that they've made
10:09
Speaker 13: a connection, a potential love interest. It is normal for
10:13
Speaker 13: them to feel this excitement, but it's not normal to
10:17
Speaker 13: have such odds stacked against them, and so it's just
10:21
Speaker 13: it's heartbreaking.
10:23
Speaker 2: You know.
10:23
Speaker 1: Melissa McCarty joining US renowned investigative journalist and author, Melissa again,
10:29
Speaker 1: thank you for being with us, Melissa. The scammer gets
10:34
Speaker 1: into their social media, the victims social media, they friend
10:40
Speaker 1: all their friends, they find out who they are chatting with,
10:42
Speaker 1: who's on their list.
10:44
Speaker 2: You on Insta, you can.
10:46
Speaker 1: See everybody that you're friends with and threaten to expose
10:52
Speaker 1: the child to them with the child's own naked photo.
10:57
Speaker 1: They have tweedled out of them. What happened here, Melissa.
11:03
Speaker 8: This was a targeted operation and it's a wide skill operation.
11:07
Speaker 8: These scammers how they work, and just like you say,
11:10
Speaker 8: they look into the social media. It's easy for them
11:13
Speaker 8: to earn his trust by saying I know you from
11:16
Speaker 8: the gym, we have mutual friends. They've already done a
11:20
Speaker 8: surveillance on his life before targeting him. So when they
11:23
Speaker 8: reached out and he received that random text messages from
11:26
Speaker 8: an unknown number at four point thirty like any other day,
11:29
Speaker 8: it was someone posing, a scammer posing as a teenage girl.
11:34
Speaker 8: So that conversation was able to move so quickly and
11:38
Speaker 8: escalate so fast because Bryce Tate ended up getting one
11:42
Speaker 8: hundred and twenty text messages within a three hour time
11:46
Speaker 8: span before he ended up taking his life. And the
11:49
Speaker 8: operation is to put him in a state of panic
11:52
Speaker 8: so he can't do anything but act in an irrational
11:55
Speaker 8: way to where he doesn't have time to think. He
11:58
Speaker 8: just acted. And it's the fear organized operation targeting young teenagers.
12:05
Speaker 1: While you were talking, Melissa McCarty, all I can think
12:08
Speaker 1: about is my own boy, John David two. Doctor Sherry
12:14
Speaker 1: Schwartz joining us forensic psychologist at Pantheromitigation dot com. Doctor Sherry,
12:21
Speaker 1: I have thousands and thousands of videos of my son
12:27
Speaker 1: and daughter, but she's more reticent than my son. I've
12:31
Speaker 1: got photos videos just like that of him crazy dancing
12:35
Speaker 1: all over the house, of me in the front yard
12:38
Speaker 1: saying run.
12:38
Speaker 2: John David, Run, Run, run as fast as.
12:40
Speaker 1: You can, and we video him and it never got old,
12:44
Speaker 1: running around the front yard, just the two of them.
12:49
Speaker 2: So full of joy and life. And that's all this.
12:54
Speaker 1: Mom and dad have left watching those videos.
12:58
Speaker 2: Over and over.
13:00
Speaker 1: And you know how many videos I've got them at
13:02
Speaker 1: the cemetery. It's it's heartbreaking and I'll circle back to Titania.
13:08
Speaker 1: But doctor Sherry, a lot of parents don't want to
13:10
Speaker 1: tell their children. They don't want to think, oh, my
13:13
Speaker 1: child might send a nude photo my child might send
13:16
Speaker 1: a topless photo.
13:17
Speaker 2: It happens in this world, but you don't want your
13:21
Speaker 2: child dead.
13:21
Speaker 1: And did you hear what Melissa McCarty was saying in
13:25
Speaker 1: Sidney summer that he was bombarded. I think he got
13:29
Speaker 1: up to around three hundred, but I know in the
13:32
Speaker 1: space of like an hour he got one hundred and
13:35
Speaker 1: twenty threatening text messages. Your life will be ruined. I
13:39
Speaker 1: will make sure I ruin your life. What will your
13:42
Speaker 1: family say when they see your penis? What will your family?
13:47
Speaker 1: What will your mom think about you? Then get the money?
13:50
Speaker 2: It just it's horrible, doctor Sherry.
13:54
Speaker 14: It's horrible, and it's a tactic designed to not give
13:58
Speaker 14: the child a chance to think. It's used on adults too,
14:02
Speaker 14: and it's a pretty effective tactic. Right when I want
14:05
Speaker 14: you to do something and I want to take control
14:06
Speaker 14: of your life, I'm just going to bombard you and
14:09
Speaker 14: not give you a moment to think about how to
14:13
Speaker 14: solve the problem without giving me exactly what I want.
14:16
Speaker 14: This is classic predatory behavior, grooming the child to get
14:22
Speaker 14: these photos and making them think they're a friend appear,
14:26
Speaker 14: and then turning around and saying, now I'm going to
14:28
Speaker 14: blow up your life. I'm going to ruin your life
14:31
Speaker 14: and to continue to bombard you with these messages and
14:35
Speaker 14: a child. One of your guests said about the brain
14:38
Speaker 14: development and not having good impulse control, which is true,
14:42
Speaker 14: and so you wouldn't think, let me put down the phone.
14:44
Speaker 14: You're nervous and you're thinking about how to solve the problem.
14:48
Speaker 8: It's just horrible.
14:50
Speaker 1: And you know, another thing got to Sherry Schwartz when
14:53
Speaker 1: we're at the supper table and we're talking about this
14:56
Speaker 1: kid and that kid that all go to school with John,
14:59
Speaker 1: David and Lucy, and they'll.
15:00
Speaker 2: Say, well, so and so is dating so and so.
15:02
Speaker 1: I'm like, they don't even drive. What do you mean
15:05
Speaker 1: they're dating, They're just talking.
15:07
Speaker 2: I'm like, what talking on the phone.
15:09
Speaker 1: And they're like, no, No, their Insta, their Snapchatre.
15:18
Speaker 2: That's dating in their minds. And these scammers.
15:22
Speaker 1: Can go on the victims wherever they are on install
15:26
Speaker 1: on Snapchat, and they can see very easily.
15:30
Speaker 2: Who they have friended. I'll just use that.
15:33
Speaker 1: Term, although it doesn't apply to everything. And then they
15:36
Speaker 1: can then find out all this what the child thinks
15:40
Speaker 1: is private info.
15:41
Speaker 2: Oh, I go to ABC school, I.
15:44
Speaker 1: Play soccer, I play football, I'm in the cooking club
15:49
Speaker 1: and so forth, and so on, and so when the
15:52
Speaker 1: scammer speaks to the child, the scammer has enough information
15:58
Speaker 1: to make it seem real.
16:00
Speaker 2: It really is a cute girl from the high school
16:02
Speaker 2: across town.
16:03
Speaker 14: That's how it happens, exactly, That's exactly how it happens.
16:08
Speaker 14: In fact, one of the pieces of advice that police
16:12
Speaker 14: will give out to school age children their parents is
16:16
Speaker 14: don't write their name on their backpack. It's the same
16:18
Speaker 14: principle because a predator can call out their name, Hey, Alyssa,
16:23
Speaker 14: and the child doesn't realize, oh, it's on my backpack,
16:26
Speaker 14: so that's where the predator got it. It's it's the
16:29
Speaker 14: same idea the child doesn't think about, Oh I posted
16:32
Speaker 14: these things on my social media and this person could
16:34
Speaker 14: be using this against me.
16:35
Speaker 15: Hey Bryce, let me tell him this. Hey Bryce, mommy
16:39
Speaker 15: need to put these tell girl boots on, because you
16:42
Speaker 15: wouldn't believe it at our house as wearing tennis shoes.
16:45
Speaker 15: After we went to the gym and I busted my
16:48
Speaker 15: butt twice.
16:51
Speaker 16: Yes, she didn't get hurt.
16:54
Speaker 9: She's all right.
16:56
Speaker 15: You hurt my back and everything.
16:58
Speaker 3: I love you, Bryce, Bryce Tait a high school honor
17:02
Speaker 3: student enjoys sports and family time, but his safety is
17:05
Speaker 3: threatened when a text from an unknown number, beinging to
17:08
Speaker 3: be a neighborhood girl, lures him into sending explicit photos,
17:13
Speaker 3: unaware it's a digital deception for financial gain.
17:18
Speaker 1: Joining me is Joe Cunningham, high profile lawyer who specializes
17:23
Speaker 1: in sextortion cases, who has previously represented the family of
17:28
Speaker 1: Timothy Barnett, who is the.
17:30
Speaker 2: Thirteen thirteen, one three.
17:32
Speaker 1: Year old victim of this type of scam, a deadly scam,
17:37
Speaker 1: and you can find him at Joe Cunningham Law dot com. Joe,
17:41
Speaker 1: thank you for being with us. I wish we were
17:45
Speaker 1: speaking under different circumstances, but in the case, one of
17:50
Speaker 1: the many cases that you've handled, it struck me that
17:53
Speaker 1: Tim Timmy Timothy Barnett was just thirteen years old, young
18:00
Speaker 1: to even process what's happening. And then as parents find
18:03
Speaker 1: him dead and.
18:05
Speaker 2: It doesn't end.
18:05
Speaker 1: You know, you would think, Joe Cunningham, that once you
18:08
Speaker 1: put out a psa public service announcement and you publicize it,
18:12
Speaker 1: and I publicize it and it's on all the news outlets,
18:16
Speaker 1: that parents would talk to their children and children would understand,
18:20
Speaker 1: but they're too young to understand.
18:22
Speaker 17: Joe, explain, that's true, Nancy, and these cases are some
18:28
Speaker 17: of the most emotionally tough cases that I deal with. They,
18:34
Speaker 17: you know, they follow a similar pattern and a similar script,
18:37
Speaker 17: and the results are always just shattering. I mean, I'm
18:41
Speaker 17: a I'm a parent, you're a parent, And I got
18:43
Speaker 17: a committee Nancy for ringing the bell on this issue
18:47
Speaker 17: so early on, and it still amazed me how many
18:51
Speaker 17: parents have no idea about these sextortion schemes that are
18:56
Speaker 17: going on, and how just how evil they are as well.
19:00
Speaker 17: I can't think of anybody more evil than those people
19:04
Speaker 17: on the other side of their phones or their computer screens.
19:07
Speaker 17: Who are you know, have these schemes ongoing to try
19:11
Speaker 17: to attack the most vulnerable people in this world are children.
19:21
Speaker 2: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace Guys. Joe Cunningham is with us.
19:28
Speaker 1: He's joining us out of Charleston, South Carolina, handles cases
19:31
Speaker 1: like this all over the country.
19:33
Speaker 2: To Todd Shipley joining US.
19:35
Speaker 1: Digital cybercrime expert former detective in Reno, Nevada, PD twenty
19:40
Speaker 1: five years in LA and author of Surviving a cyber Attack,
19:45
Speaker 1: Securing Social Media, Protecting Your Home, Investigating Internet crimes and
19:50
Speaker 1: on and on. Todd, thank you for being with us,
19:53
Speaker 1: Todd after joining us today, Todd, I don't know if
19:56
Speaker 1: you heard her. Is Jennifer Buta and Jennifer's son, Jordan
20:01
Speaker 1: DeMay was one of the first cases like this I investigated, Todd.
20:08
Speaker 1: And about two weeks after that, Todd, my producer sent
20:14
Speaker 1: me at tain sextortion case and I said, we just
20:18
Speaker 1: covered that. Do you not remember, Jennifer, we just did that,
20:23
Speaker 1: and she said, this is a different one. And then
20:29
Speaker 1: it hit me like a ton of bricks. Todd Shipley,
20:32
Speaker 1: how common this is?
20:33
Speaker 2: Todd.
20:34
Speaker 16: It's too common, and that becomes the problem that these
20:38
Speaker 16: scammers have figured out a different way to try to
20:42
Speaker 16: go after our children. And that's why I write about
20:45
Speaker 16: it my latest book about how to protect our kids
20:47
Speaker 16: and what to look for, because there are sometimes signs
20:50
Speaker 16: that these things are occurring, and we've got to be
20:53
Speaker 16: better about trying to figure out what's happening to our
20:55
Speaker 16: children because these attackers prey on them every day, and
21:00
Speaker 16: they're going out there constantly looking for this kind of
21:02
Speaker 16: thing to get small amounts of money relatively, but they're
21:08
Speaker 16: having a huge impact on our children, and it's terrible.
21:12
Speaker 4: It's straight up blackmail, is what it is. It's blackmail,
21:15
Speaker 4: it's cyberbullying, it's extortion. There's so many things going on
21:18
Speaker 4: at this and it puts fear in the kids, into
21:21
Speaker 4: their hearts and minds.
21:23
Speaker 11: In the twenty minutes before taking his own life, Bryce
21:26
Speaker 11: receives one hundred and twenty text messages from the sextortionist.
21:30
Speaker 11: Bryce offers the only money he has access to, thirty dollars,
21:34
Speaker 11: but the sextortionist tells him it isn't enough. The person
21:37
Speaker 11: on the other side of the phone actually encourages Bryce
21:40
Speaker 11: to kill himself, writing his life is already over.
21:44
Speaker 3: Adam and Amanda Tape devastated, unable to pick up the
21:46
Speaker 3: Christmas gifts already underneath the tree. Bryce knew he could
21:50
Speaker 3: confide in them about anything. The scammer's ability to shatter
21:53
Speaker 3: that bond so quickly is a testament to their insidious power.
21:57
Speaker 1: From our friends at WHS to Jennifer Buttah joining us,
22:03
Speaker 1: Jordan de May's mother who has gone on a crusade
22:07
Speaker 1: after she lost her a boy to a sextortionist. And
22:12
Speaker 1: you know, Jennifer, sextortion really is. It's a euphemism It's
22:18
Speaker 1: like putting perfume on the pig. Because the torture that
22:22
Speaker 1: Jordan went through, the emotional and mental torture he went through,
22:28
Speaker 1: and before he killed himself, it's excruciating. Explain to the
22:36
Speaker 1: listeners and viewers how you discovered that Jordan was dead.
22:42
Speaker 5: Jordan sent me a text message at three forty one
22:46
Speaker 5: in the morning that said mother, I love you, and
22:49
Speaker 5: when I got up the next morning and saw it,
22:52
Speaker 5: I texted him back. He did not respond. I texted
22:56
Speaker 5: him a second time. He didn't respond. And Jordan and
22:58
Speaker 5: I were very very close. He would always respond to me,
23:02
Speaker 5: and something just told me things were very wrong. Because
23:06
Speaker 5: Jordan would respond. I texted him a third time, and
23:09
Speaker 5: when he didn't respond, I reached out to his girlfriend
23:13
Speaker 5: to see if he was at school. Then I contacted
23:16
Speaker 5: his dad, and his dad found him in his bedroom
23:21
Speaker 5: and he had taken his own life.
23:23
Speaker 18: Ogashi, pretending to be this young woman, persuaded Jordan to
23:28
Speaker 18: send a sexually explicit image of himself. Once Samuel Ogashi
23:33
Speaker 18: had that sexually explicit image in his hand, he then
23:38
Speaker 18: turned to extort Jordan de May for money, threatening to
23:42
Speaker 18: reveal the image to Jordan's family and friends if he
23:46
Speaker 18: did not comply.
23:48
Speaker 19: This is something that probably would would have been laughing
23:50
Speaker 19: about in ten or fifteen years, after he's graduated college
23:53
Speaker 19: and gotten married and had kids and bought his first
23:55
Speaker 19: home and got a career job and did all the things.
23:58
Speaker 19: You'd look back and kind of like that was stipid, right,
24:01
Speaker 19: But in that moment, you can't. They're not old enough
24:03
Speaker 19: to understand that. They're not developed enough to understand.
24:06
Speaker 1: You're hearing Jordan's dad as John May speaking back to
24:11
Speaker 1: Jordan's mother, Jennifer, you know what John's right. Years ahead
24:17
Speaker 1: they would say, hey, can you remember when I said
24:19
Speaker 1: that naked picture?
24:20
Speaker 2: What was I thinking?
24:22
Speaker 1: And everyone would have laughed, and even if it was
24:26
Speaker 1: even mentioned, it would just be, you know, a blip
24:30
Speaker 1: on the radar, a speedbot that happened ten years before.
24:34
Speaker 1: You and Jordan had a very very close relationship. What
24:40
Speaker 1: did this scammer say to him that made him feel
24:46
Speaker 1: his only choice was death.
24:49
Speaker 5: They flooded Jordan with messages as well, and they put
24:52
Speaker 5: pressure on by having a countdown so he would have
24:55
Speaker 5: to do things within a certain period of time, and
24:58
Speaker 5: it really ramped up the anxiety for him. He was
25:01
Speaker 5: begging them to stop. He was begging for his own life.
25:05
Speaker 5: And when he was worn out and could not go
25:08
Speaker 5: anymore and said he would take his own life, they
25:10
Speaker 5: encouraged that, and in the middle of the night, my
25:13
Speaker 5: son took his own life alone. And that's something that
25:19
Speaker 5: no child should have to go through.
25:21
Speaker 1: This no child to Tanya Jordan Bark, Rental Control Chief
25:27
Speaker 1: Parent Officer.
25:28
Speaker 2: And I have BARK.
25:30
Speaker 1: I know I'm not a paid ambassador or sponsor, but
25:34
Speaker 1: Bark is a feature you put on your child's devices
25:39
Speaker 1: and every time.
25:42
Speaker 2: It's so very word sensitive.
25:44
Speaker 1: And I use this example because it's the best example
25:46
Speaker 1: I can think of.
25:48
Speaker 2: I got an alert.
25:49
Speaker 1: I nearly fell off my chair because I was sitting
25:53
Speaker 1: right here in the studio in a break. I looked
25:55
Speaker 1: over and I got a BARK alert that John David
25:59
Speaker 1: had communicated about self harm.
26:02
Speaker 2: I'm like what.
26:06
Speaker 1: I immediately, you know, stopped the taping and I looked.
26:12
Speaker 1: He is a soccer goalie and he saved a goal
26:16
Speaker 1: and it was really hard. He did a horizontal dive.
26:19
Speaker 1: Of course I have a picture of it. He's completely
26:22
Speaker 1: horizontal and his arm went through the net and he
26:25
Speaker 1: got a big bruise and he go in the picture
26:29
Speaker 1: it's him showing.
26:30
Speaker 2: Off of Bruce.
26:30
Speaker 1: He goes, it was worth that, and he's talking about
26:33
Speaker 1: he made the save. But when I saw self harm,
26:38
Speaker 1: I was so upset. And when I'm trying to think,
26:42
Speaker 1: that's how sensitive it is. The other day I got
26:45
Speaker 1: one t Tarnia an alert of an ugly word or
26:51
Speaker 1: something to do with sex. I'm like, oh, I looked
26:55
Speaker 1: at it.
26:55
Speaker 2: Guess what it was. The Nancy Gray Show.
26:58
Speaker 1: We were talking about Sean Combs and he is a
27:00
Speaker 1: subscriber and it came up on Bark. I'm like, that said,
27:05
Speaker 1: I want to talk to you, to Tanya, because you
27:07
Speaker 1: deal with this every day. You can explain better than
27:10
Speaker 1: I can't. And maybe Joe Cunningham can explain it as well.
27:14
Speaker 1: How the scammer, this person like in George's case, Agashi,
27:18
Speaker 1: Samuel Agashi far thousands of miles away. How does he
27:23
Speaker 1: know what's happening in the target's life.
27:26
Speaker 2: How did he notice? Say?
27:27
Speaker 1: Hey, I'm Julie from West Side High and I've been
27:31
Speaker 1: to your soccer gaming. You're awesome, And I know your
27:34
Speaker 1: friends Johnny and Devin and may I know them?
27:40
Speaker 2: We all go to the same blah. Blah blah blah.
27:42
Speaker 1: How do they get the information on the target to
27:45
Speaker 1: make themselves so believable.
27:48
Speaker 13: You know, it starts with us, It starts with the parents.
27:52
Speaker 13: We are curating a digital footprint for our children. So
27:55
Speaker 13: it's very important if and when you post anything about
27:58
Speaker 13: your child online a think twice, be you only post privately.
28:03
Speaker 13: Do not make anything public on your Instagram, on your Facebook, please,
28:08
Speaker 13: because they will go to the parents' accounts to figure
28:11
Speaker 13: out what they put about their kids. Then if your
28:13
Speaker 13: children have social media, which I don't recommend until at
28:16
Speaker 13: least they're sixteen years old, they need to have private accounts.
28:20
Speaker 13: These sextortionists and predators and pedophiles can find your children
28:24
Speaker 13: very easily online, especially because even if they have a
28:27
Speaker 13: private account on Instagram, they can put in their bio
28:30
Speaker 13: you know, find me on Snapchat and their username. They
28:34
Speaker 13: leave little breadcrumbs and trails. The predators can see who
28:37
Speaker 13: they're connected to, befriend them, and it only takes one
28:40
Speaker 13: or two acceptance or accepting of a friend request or
28:44
Speaker 13: a quick ad on snap to help them put the
28:46
Speaker 13: puzzle pieces together to give them just enough information to
28:50
Speaker 13: pretend to be a peer of your child. And trick them.
28:53
Speaker 13: Good kids make bad choices. Smart children are being fooled
28:56
Speaker 13: every day. The FBI has reported that sextortion is a
29:00
Speaker 13: that we all need to be paying attention to, and
29:02
Speaker 13: it's time for parents to wake up.
29:03
Speaker 4: He was on November six that the parents of Bryce
29:06
Speaker 4: Tate had called nine one one because their son had
29:09
Speaker 4: taken his own life with a firearm.
29:11
Speaker 10: Just after seven pm. Amanda and Adam Tate are shocked
29:15
Speaker 10: by the sound of a gunshot and rush into Adam's
29:18
Speaker 10: man cave. Their happy teenager shot himself. The hysterical parents
29:23
Speaker 10: called nine one one, but Bryce was gone the moment
29:25
Speaker 10: he pulled the trigger. What no one understands is why
29:29
Speaker 10: Bryce would take his own life.
29:31
Speaker 3: In just three hours. The interaction escalates to the unimaginable.
29:35
Speaker 3: After being pressured into sending explicit photos, they demanded five
29:39
Speaker 3: hundred dollars or they would release the photo to family
29:42
Speaker 3: and friends. When Bryce said he didn't have the money,
29:44
Speaker 3: their tax turned deadly.
29:48
Speaker 1: This horrific sixtortion, I call it a murder on the
29:53
Speaker 1: heels of the same scenario with a little boy.
29:57
Speaker 2: Timothy Barnett it was a morning like.
30:01
Speaker 7: Every other morning.
30:02
Speaker 16: My husband and I got up with.
30:03
Speaker 7: The alarm, He went about his day walk out the
30:09
Speaker 7: front door. A few minutes later, I get a phone
30:11
Speaker 7: call saying, lock the doors and check on my kids.
30:15
Speaker 7: So I go about the kid's rooms. They're all there
30:18
Speaker 7: except for Timothy. So I check to see if he
30:20
Speaker 7: was in the bathroom.
30:22
Speaker 8: He wasn't.
30:23
Speaker 7: Checked the kitchen and he wasn't there. So I walked
30:26
Speaker 7: out to the garage again. He wasn't there, and panic
30:29
Speaker 7: set in. So I called my husband back and I said,
30:32
Speaker 7: what's going on. He's like someone's sleeping in her front
30:35
Speaker 7: yard and I said, I can't find Timothy.
30:38
Speaker 9: And at that point I.
30:40
Speaker 7: Realized I woke up into every mother's nightmare.
30:44
Speaker 1: She can't find her little boy, Timmy Timothy. And then
30:49
Speaker 1: the husband says, somebody's sleeping in the front yard.
30:52
Speaker 10: The body in the front yard is Timothy. Cameras showed
30:55
Speaker 10: Timothy sitting in the family car for two hours the
30:58
Speaker 10: night before, frantically rolling on his phone. Timothy's napchat reveals
31:02
Speaker 10: the thirteen year old sent a stranger thirty five dollars
31:05
Speaker 10: a day to prevent them posting an explicit photo of
31:09
Speaker 10: him online. One of Timothy's last messages begged the stranger
31:13
Speaker 10: to stop reading, please, I'm just a child.
31:16
Speaker 7: Unfortunately, I was naive enough to not think that predators.
31:23
Speaker 8: Well, I knew that there were predators out there.
31:26
Speaker 7: I didn't think that there were predators so bold that
31:29
Speaker 7: would want to hurt a thirteen year old And there are.
31:35
Speaker 1: Can you even imagine your thirteen year old child killing
31:40
Speaker 1: themselves and they're lying out in the front yard while
31:42
Speaker 1: you're looking for them inside. Joe Cunningham with US high
31:46
Speaker 1: profile lawyer who specializes in cases just like this, and
31:49
Speaker 1: he represented that beautiful mom of Timmy Barnett, just thirteen
31:55
Speaker 1: years old. But when you say predator, that's really not
32:01
Speaker 1: the right word. Have you ever actually seen a hyena?
32:11
Speaker 2: Just a freaky, high pitched laugh.
32:17
Speaker 1: It sounds like crazy laugh, like maybe the Joker on Batman,
32:22
Speaker 1: like crazy high pitch kind of cross between a yell
32:26
Speaker 1: and a scream. And they will attack a living person
32:31
Speaker 1: if that living person is trying to drag away a
32:35
Speaker 1: dead carcass, they will attack the living person.
32:39
Speaker 2: And they go in packs.
32:41
Speaker 1: They're evil, they smell, they smell, They eat rotting, decayed flesh.
32:50
Speaker 2: That's what these scammers.
32:52
Speaker 1: Scammers not even the right word they're killers, that's what
32:55
Speaker 1: they are, to go after our babies, our children. I
33:01
Speaker 1: mean since Timmy's case that you worked on, there have
33:05
Speaker 1: been so many others, including the one we're covering right now.
33:10
Speaker 2: Joe.
33:12
Speaker 16: Yeah.
33:12
Speaker 17: I think as of late, there's been over two thousand
33:15
Speaker 17: cases in the United States. And you're right, Nancy, this
33:19
Speaker 17: is just pure evil and a lot of it's stemming
33:21
Speaker 17: from these gangs along the Ivory Coast of Africa, but
33:25
Speaker 17: it's happening all over the globe. Groups like seven sixty
33:29
Speaker 17: four who are encouraging kids to either mulate themselves or
33:33
Speaker 17: carve those numbers, those gang numbers into their.
33:37
Speaker 2: Bodys or them up.
33:39
Speaker 1: Wait, we wait, they trick children into mutilating, cutting themselves.
33:49
Speaker 17: That's right, that's right, this group seven sixty four, and
33:53
Speaker 17: then oftentimes and request them to upload pictures of the
33:57
Speaker 17: cuts and if it's not deep enough, to ask them
33:59
Speaker 17: to cut deep. I mean, it is completely sadistic, Nancy,
34:04
Speaker 17: as to what's going on. There are many groups and
34:06
Speaker 17: gangs in it for the money, and there are other
34:09
Speaker 17: groups that are in it just for the torture of
34:12
Speaker 17: our kids. And then they'll encourage those kids to bring
34:15
Speaker 17: their younger siblings into the mix. What's happening right now
34:20
Speaker 17: is it should be a wake up call for all
34:23
Speaker 17: parents right now.
34:30
Speaker 2: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.
34:36
Speaker 3: In the crucial twenty minutes before his death, scammers relentlessly
34:39
Speaker 3: pressure Bryce to end his life, culminating in a tragic
34:43
Speaker 3: gunshot that plunges his parents into unfathorable greeting.
34:48
Speaker 1: How many children will die because of six stortion.
34:53
Speaker 20: Listen, I am more determined to write your life than
34:56
Speaker 20: to make it a waste, a trash can, a shame
34:58
Speaker 20: of dishonor a hell, a real disaster, a hell on earth.
35:03
Speaker 20: And I remind you that I am heartless. I have
35:06
Speaker 20: no pity to ride a life as well as yours.
35:09
Speaker 20: This was one of almost two hundred messages sent to
35:12
Speaker 20: my child over the span of nineteen and a half hours.
35:15
Speaker 20: I am begging you to stand with this, stand up,
35:18
Speaker 20: do something.
35:19
Speaker 1: From c span children as young as twelve and thirteen
35:23
Speaker 1: dying at the hands of these online hyenas. I want
35:30
Speaker 1: to go back to Jennifer Uta joining us. Her son
35:34
Speaker 1: lost his life to one of these scammers. And I
35:39
Speaker 1: don't know if you feel the same way, Jennifer, but
35:40
Speaker 1: scammer really is that's like I'm editing the truth.
35:48
Speaker 2: There's so much worse than a scammer.
35:53
Speaker 5: That's putting it mild day, calling them a scanner. I mean,
35:56
Speaker 5: they're responsible for killing my son.
36:00
Speaker 1: Effectively, does the name Gavin Guffey ring a bell? Because
36:04
Speaker 1: I will never forget him.
36:06
Speaker 3: A month after Gavin shoots himself in a bathroom at home,
36:09
Speaker 3: his family members start receiving Instagram messages asking for money
36:13
Speaker 3: in exchange for not releasing nude photos of Gavin. His
36:16
Speaker 3: father even gets a message, did I tell you your son?
36:19
Speaker 3: Begged for his life. The Guffies discovered Gavin had been
36:23
Speaker 3: tricked into sending nude photos to a person he believed
36:26
Speaker 3: was a girl his age, then extorted.
36:29
Speaker 6: Gavin was being blackmailed. That was all the information that
36:32
Speaker 6: I knew, was that he was being blackmail But what
36:35
Speaker 6: happened was Gavin was he got caught up in sex
36:40
Speaker 6: stortion and this is a major crime. They took looks
36:44
Speaker 6: like Hunter Bodden headlines and put pictures of Gavin and
36:47
Speaker 6: put my name and his name on the headlines, and
36:52
Speaker 6: we're threatening to release it. And it was pictures who
36:55
Speaker 6: this girl that he was talking to online.
36:58
Speaker 2: Gavin now dead. That was his father, who is a.
37:03
Speaker 1: South Carolina representative. So even people that are influential and prestigious,
37:11
Speaker 1: their children have died at the hands of these online
37:17
Speaker 1: hyenas that are literally tearing at the flesh of our children.
37:22
Speaker 1: And many of these so called scammers are in different countries.
37:25
Speaker 2: And isn't it true to Tanya.
37:27
Speaker 1: That one scammer can be working on literally thousands of
37:33
Speaker 1: children at the same time.
37:35
Speaker 2: Like you and I go to work, they go.
37:37
Speaker 1: Down to their basement where they have a fleet of strings,
37:42
Speaker 1: and they're working all day long to get thirty dollars
37:45
Speaker 1: off this kid, three hundred dollars off that kid, twenty
37:47
Speaker 1: dollars off this kid, and it works.
37:49
Speaker 2: They make a living off our children. To Tanya.
37:54
Speaker 13: Absolutely and Joe Cunningham alluded to the seven six four network,
37:57
Speaker 13: which is a very real credit and frightening threat. It's
38:02
Speaker 13: very dark and it is a network. They have multiple
38:07
Speaker 13: entities across the globe and using the help of AI
38:10
Speaker 13: and chatbots to create the relationship almost like a business
38:17
Speaker 13: development spam caller, and then once they realize they have
38:21
Speaker 13: somebody on the hook, then it transfers to a human.
38:24
Speaker 13: It is a multifaceted, very deep, very highly organized criminal ring,
38:30
Speaker 13: and our children are the collateral damage.
38:33
Speaker 1: He little boy, just thirteen years old, J Taylor loses
38:38
Speaker 1: his life.
38:39
Speaker 9: They were saying horrible things miss Gender and him calling him.
38:45
Speaker 9: They said that they got him to kill himself, and
38:49
Speaker 9: they were saying in the group chat they wanted to
38:52
Speaker 9: do it to someone else.
38:53
Speaker 3: J Taylor, thirteen makes a discord account to connect with
38:56
Speaker 3: other crocheted users, pressure the team to kill himself. Response
39:00
Speaker 3: he doesn't want to die, But after an hour of
39:02
Speaker 3: constant messages, Jay creeps out of his home, props up
39:05
Speaker 3: an Instagram live stream, and hangs himself from a fence,
39:09
Speaker 3: and Australian sends Jay's final stream to his devastated parents,
39:13
Speaker 3: the video eventually leading to the twenty year old German
39:16
Speaker 3: med student.
39:17
Speaker 5: They took advantage of Jay's loneliness and his kindness and
39:21
Speaker 5: then they completely prayed on his insecurities.
39:24
Speaker 1: That from our friend's at ABC's Nightline, me Lissa McCarty
39:27
Speaker 1: joining US investigative journalist. In that case, a thirteen year
39:33
Speaker 1: old boy is dead because of a German med student,
39:37
Speaker 1: a medical student that was running the scam.
39:41
Speaker 8: This is an international crime circuit, Nancy, just targeting and
39:45
Speaker 8: praying on innocence. That's what they do. There are hundreds
39:48
Speaker 8: of cases that the FBI is investigating just like that one.
39:52
Speaker 1: You're right, Melissa, and it's not just little boys, girls too.
39:57
Speaker 10: Amanda twelve goes to a chat site with friends and
40:00
Speaker 10: receives compliments and attention. One asks Amanda to flash the
40:03
Speaker 10: camera and eventually the girl gives in. The man whoses
40:06
Speaker 10: the photos to blackmail Amanda. When she refuses, the extortionist
40:10
Speaker 10: sends the photo to class, meets, friends, and family members.
40:13
Speaker 10: Amanda is bullied relentlessly, switching schools three times, the extortionists
40:18
Speaker 10: following her every move.
40:20
Speaker 1: I got a message on Facebook from him. Don't know
40:24
Speaker 1: him or how he knew me. It said, if you
40:28
Speaker 1: don't put on a show for me, I will send
40:30
Speaker 1: your boobs. He knew my address, school, relatives, friends, family names,
40:39
Speaker 1: knock at my threatens to knock at my door at
40:41
Speaker 1: four a m. It was a police. My photo was
40:45
Speaker 1: sent everywhere.
40:46
Speaker 11: Amanda hangs herself in her home. Police discover communications with
40:50
Speaker 11: todd on Dutch national Aiden Coben's computer, along with a
40:53
Speaker 11: list of six thousand potential victims and their social networks.
40:57
Speaker 11: He's now serving thirteen years behind bars.
41:00
Speaker 1: A Dutch national got into this little girl and that
41:05
Speaker 1: was her. That was Amanda Todd telling her story with cards,
41:10
Speaker 1: holding up those que cards that I was reading for
41:13
Speaker 1: you on YouTube. And now that precious little girl, precious
41:19
Speaker 1: just twelve years old when this started, is dead. She's
41:25
Speaker 1: dead and the guy that did it, a Dutch national,
41:29
Speaker 1: got thirteen years behind bars.
41:30
Speaker 2: He's probably already out.
41:34
Speaker 1: If you know or think you know anything about crimes
41:38
Speaker 1: like these, you can save a life one eight hundred
41:44
Speaker 1: call FBI. That's a cyber tip line. Eight hundred call
41:49
Speaker 1: FBI or go to cyber Tipline dot org. We remember
41:55
Speaker 1: an American hero, Deputy Sheriff Daniel Kin of wayan Dat
41:59
Speaker 1: County Sheriff's Ohio, killed in the line of duty, leaving
42:04
Speaker 1: behind a grieving wife and two little children. American hero
42:08
Speaker 1: Deputy Sheriff Daniel Kin.
42:12
Speaker 2: Nancy Grace signing off goods friend