2 men in Nigeria to be charged for 2023 sextortion death of Australian teenager
Under Nigeria’s criminal justice system, an accused can be prosecuted locally for alleged crimes in another country.
![Two Nigerian suspects of cybercrime were unknown persons to their Austalian victim who was forced to take his own life when he could not come up the money his blackmailers were asking. [AFP/NSW Police]](https://i0.wp.com/meiza.ng/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Sextortion-Suspects--e1712574859340.png?fit=1200%2C1000&ssl=1)
In New South Wales, Australia, the police there are celebrating their remarkable achievement of cracking a sextortion case that led to the arrest of two men in Nigeria this past March.
The pair reportedly threatened to release nude images of an Australian teen if he didn’t pay them $500, which then led to his suicide in 2023.
Just like the victim, the suspects’ identities have not been revealed. Still, a press statement from the New South Wales police confirmed that they were picked up from a slum in Nigeria where they would also face justice under Australian laws if found guilty.
Under Nigeria’s criminal justice system, an accused can be prosecuted locally for alleged crimes in another country if they are present in Nigeria, although exceptional scenarios could also warrant an extradition but not in this case of sextortion.
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Reacting to the situation of things, the head of the New South Wales crime command’s cybercrime squad, Detective Superintendent Matthew Craft, said we’ve seen a huge spike in sextortion cases, which are up nearly 400% in the last 18 months.
He says the good news is people are reporting it and there are steps we can take to help you before it goes too far. We want young people to continue to report these cases and to never be embarrassed to talk to police.
Steps were taken to arrest the suspects in March after several weeks of building the case. It started with the New South Wales police investigating the suicide, which then climaxed to the Australian Federal Police’s involvement.
From this point, the investigation then elevated to a multinational cybercrime investigation, which demanded the contribution of South Africa working alongside the authorities to fish out the suspects.
The Australian Federal Police’s commander, Helen Schneider, summed up the collaboration in her comment confirming that the sextortion of children is a borderless crime, as these arrests show.
Ayodelé is a Lagos-based journalist and the Content and Editorial Coordinator at Meiza. All around the megacity, I am steering diverse lifestyle magazine audiences with ingenious hacks and insights that spur fast, informed decisions in their busy lives.
