Soldier jailed for 15 years after persuading 12-year-old girl to send him naked pictures and then leaking them on social media
An American soldier reportedly persuaded a 12-year-old British girl to share her nude pictures with him on the photo-sharing app Snapchat and then later shared the images with her classmates on Instagram. Reports state that he did so by creating a fake profile on Instagram after she stopped talking to him. The 21-year-old military police officer, Christopher Ernest Fox, was eventually arrested and sentenced to 15 years in prison for producing child pornography, according to reports.
Fox reportedly began talking to the child on Snapchat in August 2016 and the girl, who can not be named, reportedly told him she was 13 at the time. According to the Honolulu Star Advertiser, the youngster shared her naked pictures with the military man online after he continuously insisted that she do so. She later blocked him but he instead threatened her said that he would share the pictures with her friends if she did not send him more explicit pictures of herself.
After she refused to heed to his threat, the serviceman created a fake Instagram page with the girl's name and uploaded all the pictures she had sent to him on the app.
Eventually, the pictures began circulating around the girl's school and bullies started forcing her to stay home and not attend the classes at the institution. It was then when her parent's found out what had happened and approached police officials in Wilshire, England.
Fox, who was working at the Schofield Barracks in Honolulu, Hawaii at the time, was arrested in August 2017. He was later discharged from the Army in December that year. Fox admitted to sexually exploiting a child earlier this year in April, according to the Daily Mail. Reports state that the girl, who is now 14, traveled to Honolulu to watch her perpetrator get sentenced to prison for 15 years.
Assistant US Attorney Morgan Early, told the judge that the teenager and her mother were too upset to make victim impact statements during the sentencing. The serviceman would have been given a more rigorous prison sentence of up to 30 years, however, the judges gave him a lighter sentence considering his age. They believe that the 21-year-old has an opportunity for rehabilitation, according to reports.
In addition to the prison term, U.S. District Chief Judge J. Michael Seabright ordered Fox to pay $10,000 restitution to the girl's mother and must submit to 10 years of restrictive court supervision after he gets out of prison. Seabright said he doesn't believe Fox isn't repentant of the crime he had committed. In a letter to the court, Fox described what happened to the girl as a "blip in the road" in her life.