A man from Mount Juliet was sentenced Thursday to 27 years in prison for reportedly extorting and threatening several minors into performing sex acts on camera. In addition to the prison sentence, the man will also have a lifetime of supervised release.
The Department of Justice released a statement on Thursday that said Caleb D. Jordan, 22, met three minors online through a video game platform. He reportedly told the minors — all of whom were between 11 and 14 years of age — that someone was coming to “get them” and threatened to kill or sexually assault their parents if they did not create videos of themselves performing sex acts.
The statement said Jordan told the minors to perform and record specific sex acts and used the children to create nearly 400 sexually explicit videos, some of which depict the victims crying or in visible distress.
Jordan reportedly attempted to sell the illegal content over an encrypted internet chatting application, per the report. The electronic devices that were seized by the authorities contained more than 10,000 images and videos of child sexual abuse material.
The announcement of the development was collectively made by United States Attorney Henry C. Leventis for the Middle District of Tennessee, Acting Assistant Attorney General Nicole M. Argentieri of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, and Special Agent in Charge Rana Saoud of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Nashville.
The investigative effort was reportedly part of Project Safe Childhood, which was a nationwide effort kicked off by the Department of Justice in May 2006 to combat child sexual exploitation and abuse.
A couple in Georgia were recently sentenced after an investigation revealed that they had been involved in distributing child sex abuse images. The wife, Allyn Sandridge, was a former special education teacher at a middle school.
The two had actively been engaged in child sex material since 2017, when the husband, William, expressed his sexual fantasies he had about prepubescent children. Messages the authorities apparently recovered included explicit images of children.
The authorities in the case reportedly uncovered multiple cell phones and a desktop computer that contained graphic images of child sex abuse. Allyn cooperated with the authorities and revealed the material her husband had sent to her phone, according to the report.
Federal prosecutors mentioned that some of the images recovered included children actively engaged in sexually explicit material.
Mt. Juliet man admits to threatening to kill kids’ parents unless they sent him sexual videoswww.youtube.com
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