Alleged Serial Cyber Predator Pleads Guilty to Numerous Charges

A 21-year-old Tewksbury man who allegedly coerced underage girls into sending him nude photos and then, in some cases, blackmailed them to have sex with him has pleaded guilty to numerous charges, including rape of a child by force, according to a Tuesday release from the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office.

A 15-year-old Medford girl was the first victim to come forward against Thomas Hutchinson in July 2011.

Hutchinson pleaded guilty in Woburn’s Middlesex Superior Court in two cases in which he was charged with rape of a child by force, rape, assault with intent to rape a child, indecent assault and battery on a child under 14 (two counts), indecent assault and battery on a person over 14 (two counts), attempted extortion (four counts), child enticement, possession of child pornography (17 counts), posing a child in a state of sexual conduct (10 counts), posing a child in a state of nudity (10 counts), dissemination of visual matter of a child in sexual conduct (three counts), dissemination of visual matter of a child in a state of nudity, dissemination of matter harmful to a minor (two counts) and carrying a dangerous weapon.

Sentence

Middlesex Superior Court Judge Edward Leibensperger sentenced Hutchinson to 10-15 years in prison with 15 years probation to follow.

While on probation, Hutchinson can have no direct or indirect contact with any of the victims and no unsupervised contact with children under 18. He has to comply with the requirements of the Sex Offender Registry, undergo sex offender treatment, refrain from certain use of the Internet or any computers or smart phones and comply with GPS monitoring, according to the release.

“This case is a stark reminder of the potential dangers of predators who manipulate the relative freedom of the Internet for their own ends,” Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan said in a statement.

Investigation

Hutchinson would pose as someone with connections to the modeling business on social-networking sites like MyYearbook.com and Facebook.com, prosecutors said. He went by “Brittany,” “steve.modeling,” “Sean Mullen,” and “Jess Adams” and solicited nude photos of the underage girls and asked them to perform sexual acts on camera for what he said were auditions for modeling jobs, they said.

He then threatened to post or publish the photos and videos unless the victims complied with his demands. In several instances, as a result of these threats, victims agreed to meet the Hutchinson and were then sexually assaulted by him, according to the release.

During the investigation, authorities searched Hutchinson’s computer and found numerous photos and videos that were pornographic in nature, depicting dozens of children, mostly female, according to the release.

Authorities were able to identify 17 victims in addition to the Medford girl. They also discovered tens of thousands of entries in Skype log files, showing hundreds of chat conversations, incoming and outgoing calls and file transfers between dozens of potential victims and Hutchinson, according to the release.

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