A trial opened at Roskilde District Court on Wednesday against a 26-year-old man accused of sexually extorting 43 girls and an 18-year-old woman online. Prosecutors are asking for a sentence of preventive detention.
According to DR, the man is charged with rape, attempted rape, grooming, unlawful coercion and indecent assault. The alleged victims were between 12 and 18 years old. The first day of the trial was September 23.
The prosecution says the man pressured the young people into sending sexual material for about two years, primarily over Snapchat. Prosecutor Anne-Mette Seerup told the court that Danish law also treats an assault as rape when the offender and victim are not physically together. That applies when the victim is induced to carry out the physical act.
The defendant denies the most serious charges. He acknowledges several counts of indecent assault and possession of pornographic material involving minors, DR reports.
Payments followed by threats
Per the prosecution, the man contacted the girls on social media and offered money for intimate or sexual material. In some cases he sent 50 kroner, in others 400 kroner. He also promised far larger sums if they complied with his requests.
Once he received the material, prosecutors say he used it to extort further videos and photos, often of a more serious nature. In several cases he threatened to tell the girls’ parents or to spread the material on social media.
The case reached police after a 15-year-old girl in the Central and West Jutland Police district reported a sexual assault said to have taken place over Snapchat. Two further reports concerned the same Snapchat account. Mid and West Zealand Police, covering the district where the man lived, then requested a search warrant.
Officers found several phones at the defendant’s home, some of them in a safe. Investigators identified the many alleged victims through those devices, according to DR’s report from the courtroom.
In court, the man confirmed that he had multiple phones. He described having one primary phone and another used for recording. He said he found it more interesting to receive material than to search for pornography himself.
He also told the court that he often could not get older women or women his own age to send material, and therefore approached young girls. He said that in many cases he did not know the girls were under 15.
Senior prosecutor Anne-Mette Serup said the demand for preventive detention rests on personal circumstances, a psychiatric assessment and the scale of the case. The man has been in pre-trial detention since September 2024. The district court has set aside more than 30 days, with a decision expected in late January 2027.
