COLUMBUS, Ohio — A Columbus man pleaded guilty on Wednesday to sexually exploiting and sextorting more than 25 victims across three states.
Lorenzo Winfield, 22, pleaded guilty to sexually exploiting minors, possessing child pornography and communicating interstate with the intent to extort, according to the U.S. District Attorneys Office of Southern Ohio.
As part of his plea, it was recommended he serve a prison sentence of 23 to 27 years.
Court documents say Winfield used extortion to solicit and collect explicit photos of underage girls at his high school, the Arts and College of Preparatory Academy where he was known as the "ACPA Hacker."
Authorities say Winfield would contact students at ACPA and demand nude photos of them. He would also hack into victims' social media accounts and use the photos he obtained against them.
Winfield would tell the victims he had nude photos of them or other students that he would distribute to friends or family unless the victims complied. Winfield followed through on the threats multiple times by distributing photos of his victims to prove he was serious in an attempt to get more content, authorities said.
Winfield used multiple social media accounts to participate in the exploitation and extortion of the victims that have been identified so far. He was active on Discord, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Skype and Google Hangouts.
Winfield was also being investigated by the FBI Washington Field Office for extorting and exploiting at least four victims in Virginia.
In one of the cases, Winfield made contact with a victim who was 11 years old at the time. He sent nude photos of the victim to students at a Virginia middle school and, as she got older, to her high school. The victim originally met Winfield through a social media game. he threatened to harm her family if she did not comply with his requests for sexually explicit photos and videos and continued to exploit her until authorities arrested him.
If you believe you were a victim of Winfield's crimes or have information related to the case, contact the FBI at 614-849-1733.