A California man was sentenced yesterday to prison for five years for cyberstalking several young girls in California in an “sextortion” campaign he waged while he was an active-duty member of the U.S. Marine Corps.
In court papers in May 2019 and February 20, 2021 Johao Miguel Chavarri, also known as Michael Frito, 26, of Torrance was stalked and made anonymous threats to numerous victims.
Chavarri frequently referred to himself by the name “Frito,” contacted victims on social media platforms, including Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter and praised their appearance and/or their publicly posted photos, and suggested a relationship that would see him be paid by the victim for sending him photos or videos. A few of the victims agreed to Chavarri’s suggestions and sent him explicit sexually explicit or compromising images. When the victims refused Chavarri’s initial request for photos, refusing to send him more photos or videos, or otherwise refused to continue to communicate with him online, Chavarri began to harass and threaten the victims via a variety of online accounts. In the majority of instances, he threatened to publish sexually explicit images and videos of victims on popular pornography websites and/or to distribute the sexual photos or videos to the victims friends, boyfriends family members, employers, or boyfriends and would usually explicitly identify with the name of.
Chavarri was fined a $15,000 fine and to serve three years of supervision.
Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite, Jr. of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; Acting U.S. Attorney Stephanie S. Christensen for the Central District of California; Assistant Director Luis Quesada of the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division; and Supervisory Special Agent Adam Smith of the FBI Los Angeles Field Office made the announcement.
The FBI Los Angeles Field Office, Long Beach Resident Agency was involved in the investigation, with the assistance of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
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