Description
A computer hacker who was jailed for tormenting three young girls began a new campaign of abuse days after being released from prison.
Ryan Campbell, 22, sent intimidate photos of his newest victim to family members and doctored a newspaper article to falsely suggest she was a paedophile.
Cambell hacked into the womans account before escalating his abusive and intrusive behaviour after she decided against speaking to him.
He had previously been jailed for 20 months in September 2020 for making three young girls lives a misery, the Liverpool Echo reports.
They included a child aged 12 or 13, after she refused to send him naked pictures; a 16-year-old ex-partner, who he told to kill herself; and a 15-year-old victim, who he tormented by pretending to be her alleged rapist.
Liverpool Crown Court heard that within days of being released from prison, he sent a friend request on Snapchat to his latest victim, a young woman who LancsLive has chosen not to name. Rebecca Smith, prosecuting, said at first she had normal conversations with Campbell, in October 2021.
He was using the account Ry Antrickz, said he was 22 and from Liverpool, and would come and visit her in another part of the country.
Due to the distance between the two, she decided they wouldnt be friends and blocked him on Snapchat, only to receive numerous friend requests. In November he contacted her on Facebook Messenger making threats to hack her bank account if she did not speak with him and accused her of contacting many boys.
The woman told him she didnt want to argue but he replied big mistake and she blocked him on Facebook.
On November 17, she received an email saying action was required on her Facebook account, but discovered the password had been changed.
Friends told her a photo of her sticking her tongue out and a video of her dancing was posted on her Facebook wall, before Campbell messaged her on WhatsApp saying want me to stop? with laughing emojis.
Ms Smith said Campbell sent her texts containing the postcode of her old home and her grandads address and said he was travelling there. The messages became more sinister and abusive when he accused her of attention seeking about wanting to self-harm and kill herself.
He sent a friend of hers messages from her Facebook account, who asked who he was.
Campbell replied: Haha long story but we had a takeover because shes a slag basically.
On November 20 he text her someone put your number on Gumtree as an escort with a laughing emoji. Campbell then sent her stepmum an article from the Independent newspaper with the headline: Sinister female paedophile who abused nursery children handed suspended sentence.
It had been edited to include the womans name, photo and the area where she lived.
Ms Smith said: She found that extremely offensive and was shocked.
Family and friends later contacted her to say Campbell had sent intimate photos of her to a Facebook messenger group chat. The woman said she believed he had hacked her Snapchat account to seize these private sexual images.
She discovered Campbell had previously been jailed for similar offences and managed to change all her passwords.
But he then hacked her old Instagram account and messaged her from it, saying: Want me to remove the lock off your bank then or nah?
Days later, he placed a series of orders on Just Eat to her address, leading to irate delivery drivers ringing her demanding payment. She fled her home on November 21 to seek refuge, reported him to the police, and didnt return until December 1, after he had been arrested.
The victim, appearing via video link, today read out a statement in which she described how Campbell left her housebound and suicidal.
She told the court: This boy has destroyed my life.
Campbell, of Smith Road, Kirkdale, admitted computer hacking, harassment and disclosing private sexual photographs.
The court heard he has since been recalled to prison to serve the remainder of his 20-month sentence.
Jonathan Duffy, defending, said in a letter to the court Campbell accepted what he did was wrong and when interviewed by police, had said he deeply regretted his actions and was genuinely very sorry for the distress that he had caused.
Mr Duffy said their online friendship/relationship and the nature or depth of it was misjudged by Campbell, who then behaved in a wholly inappropriate way, which had the hallmarks of immaturity.
The lawyer asked for full one third credit for Campbells early guilty pleas.
Recorder Ian Harris said he was entitled to that, but it would be for him to judge how remorseful Campbell was, who was an accomplished hacker of computers and of other peoples personal details.
Mr Duffy said: He disclosed in that letter how problems hes experienced in his family, the deaths of people close to him, caused him to lose, or to think in a way which he now, having had time to reflect of course, deeply regrets.
Recorder Harris told Campbell: This behaviour of yours was criminal and cowardly. It paralysed your victim with fear. She became suicidal and reclusive.
He said she was courageous to read her statement, which referred to the fact that her whole way of life, friendships and work, had been disrupted by you.
The judge said: You say youre sorry for the distress that youve caused.
Ive read your letter, which sets out your reasons for committing these offences. I dont accept that the reasons that are set out in your letter are any excuse...
It is in my judgement offensive to refer to personal matters as you have done in that letter and in some way try to blame those matters for you committing those offences, when you had only just been released from prison for the same, or a similar type of offending.
Recorder Harris concluded: I dont find there is any remorse that I can take into account.
He jailed him for two years and imposed an indefinite restraining order and five-year Criminal Behaviour Order, restricting his internet use.