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Matthew K. Walsh, 24, admitted that he created the fake profiles that he used to contact the boys from 2016 until 2021, according to the Department of Justice.
The boys Walsh targeted ranged from 12 to 17 years old, they said. At least 40 victims have been identified as being abused by Walsh, and at least 30 of those had their content distributed to others.
Walsh used several platforms to entice the boys to send the sexual images and videos, and would blackmail them into sending him more by threatening to send the original images to the victims' friends and family, prosecutors said.
Walsh demanded that the victims include their faces in the images to further scare the minors into complying with his requests.
Some of the communications between Walsh and the victims showed the minors crying and begging Walsh to not send the images to their friends and classmates and to leave them alone.
Despite the victims' pleas, Walsh continued to harass some of the victims for years, obtaining hundreds of files of explicit content from them in the process, according to officials.
Approximately 2,000 images and videos were obtained in the exploitation of the minor boys.
Walsh would save the files into folders of fake names or a variation of the victim's real name in a cloud storage account, prosecutors said. He would upload some of the minor males' files to various twitter accounts, and even sold some of the files to others.
Walsh obtained around $8,000 from the sale of child pornography.
Walsh communicated with at least 50 different Twitter users interested in purchasing individual or collection files of child sex abuse material, officials added. Some Twitter users even exchanged tips with Walsh on how to evade law enforcement, and discussed different ways to lure minors into providing sexual content.
Federal search warrants were executed on dozens of online accounts all created and utilized by Walsh.
Walsh faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in federal prison and a maximum of 30 years in federal prison for the production of child pornography.
As required by his plea agreement, Walsh will make full restitution to all minor victims of his offenses as to all counts charged, whether or not he has entered a guilty plea to those counts.
Upon his release from prison, Walsh will be required to register as a sex offender in the place where he resides, is an employee, and is a student.
Sentencing has been scheduled for Friday, Nov. 4.
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