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Father who catfished his 14-year-old daughter is facing 250 years in jail.

 

Trigger warning: This post deals with incest and child sexual abuse.

In a particularly sickening case from the US, a father has admitted to catfishing his own teen daughter online.

Posing as the 14-year-old girl’s online boyfriend, the upstate New York man coerced her into sending naked photos of herself. He later used those images as leverage when he began sexually abusing her, Syracuse.com reports.

In a further manipulative twist, the middle-aged man even pretended the girl’s online boyfriend had committed suicide after she broke up with him.

Posing as the 14-year-old girl’s online boyfriend, the upstate New York man coerced her into sending naked photos of herself.

The horrifying series of events began when the 41-year-old father set up accounts on Instagram, AOL and a texting service in September 2013 under a fake name.

Masquerading as a 16-year-old boy, he started chatting online with his daughter. Eventually, the pair began calling each other boyfriend and girlfriend.

The man, whose identity is being concealed to protect the girl’s privacy, then pressed the girl for nude photos. While the girl initially resisted, she eventually gave in and sent the images.

The girl eventually ended the relationship, telling her so-called boyfriend: “All you talk about is sex sex and more sex. Honestly that is not what a relationship is about,” Syracuse.com reports.

That’s when the so-called boyfriend threatened to show the girl’s nude selfies to her dad, telling her: “Then I will send these to your dad and then I won’t have to worry about anyone else having u.”

The man pressed the girl for nude photos, and the teenager eventually gave in.

The girl protested, telling him that would ruin her life.

“I told you that a bunch of times when we were dating that I don’t like those pics and now you are threatening me that if I don’t send you those then you’ll send my dad the ones I sent you before?” she texted. “My life is ruined.”

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She added: “You said that about the other one and now you’re threatening to send it to my father, who by the way will kill me.”

The girl went ahead and ended the online relationship, but her unthinkable ordeal was far from over.

The teenager soon received a message from the boy’s account from someone claiming to be his mother, court papers said. The text message said the boy had committed suicide after she’d split from him.

The father reportedly often referred to the nude photographs and told her how much he liked them.

Soon after that, her father began molesting the girl.

During the abuse, the father often referred to the nude photographs and told her how much he liked them, Assistant U.S. Attorney Lisa Fletcher wrote in court papers.

Eventually, the girl approached the school nurse, which sparked a police investigation.

When the girl told police she’d been in an online relationship with the 16-year-old boy from Watertown, New York, police tracked down the texting account the supposed boy was using — and discovered the messages had been sent from someone in the girl’s own home.

The father, from Herkimer County, pleaded guilty on Monday to 12 federal counts of enticing a child to produce child pornography, as well as receiving and sending child pornography.

He sobbed in court as he admitted his guilt, Syracuse.com reported.

“It is very emotional,” he told the judge. “I’m giving away many years of my life.”

He now faces up to 250 years in prison when he is sentenced in July.

For help or information, call Lifeline on 131 114 or Bravehearts on 1800 272 831 or www.bravehearts.org.au. CASA Ballarat can be contacted on 5320-3933.