Man charged with ‘webcam blackmail’ of Tyrone boy who took his own life

A man has been charged with the blackmail of a 17-year-old schoolboy from Co Tyrone who took his own life after being duped into sending intimate photos of himself over the internet.

Ronan Hughes (17) killed himself in June 2015 after learning that individuals he met online had followed through with a threat to send images of him to one of his Facebook friends unless he paid them £3,300.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) said on Friday that a 31-year-old man has appeared at Bucharest Municipal Court, Romania, charged with producing and distributing indecent images of children and blackmail.

The PSNI confirmed the charges were connected to an investigation into “webcam blackmail” linked to the death of Ronan Hughes. The 31-year-old has been remanded in custody.

The PSNI said it had been liaising with a number of agencies in a variety of jurisdictions, including Policia Româna (Romanian Police), the Directorate for Investigating Organised Crime and Terrorism in Romania, the National Crime Agency, and Europol.

Detective Superintendent Gary Reid from the PSNI’s Reactive and Organised Crime Branch, said: “Detectives from the PSNI are currently in Romania assisting our colleagues with this phase of the investigation.

“This has been complex and protracted and we are grateful to our colleagues in our partner agencies for their assistance to date. As legal proceedings are now ongoing, it would be inappropriate to comment further at this stage. However, I would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone in Northern Ireland to be mindful of their online activity, particularly with strangers.”

Gerard and Teresa Hughes, Ronan’s parents, said their “quiet, happy-go-lucky” child had been tricked into sending images on a social network site after receiving pictures of a girl.

Ms Hughes said her son, a pupil at St Joseph’s Grammar School in Donaghmore, confided to her near midnight three days before he died. “He came to me and said, ‘I’m in trouble here’,” she said in an interview after his death.

“He gave me his phone. They were looking for more than £3,000 for an image he had posted and told him they were going to show it to all his friends. They had sent him a list of all his Facebook friends. He texted them back to say, ‘but I’m only 17’.”

Mr Hughes brought his son to a PSNI station at Dungannon immediately, but he said there was only one officer on duty at that time of the night and he said there was not a lot he could do.

“I knew Ronan was looking for help and I told him (the officer) that all my son wanted is for these images not to be posted. He told us that he couldn’t guarantee that.

“For Ronan, it was totally dismissive. If the police had given Ronan reassurance and said, ‘we’ll contact IT experts, we’ll close this down, we’ll stop that’, Ronan would still be here today. That’s why he came to us. He wanted help.”