Lakewood man who posed as teen, posted sexually explicit videos of minor on TikTok, pleads guilty

LAKEWOOD, Ohio — A Lakewood man who posed as a 15-year-old girl on social media and received explicit photos of a minor before posting them to TikTok, pleaded guilty Monday to the distribution of child pornography, according to a news release from Leonard C Boyle, Acting United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut.Brian Grinnell, 36 of Lakewood, posed as a 15-year-old girl and met a girl who was under 12 years old on Omegle, an online website and mobile application that allows users to interact with strangers, according to the news release.During their communication on the app, Grinnell and the minor started communicating on Snapchat where he told the minor victim to take sexually explicit photos and videos of herself and send them to him over Snapchat.After she felt threatened by Grinnell, the girl unfriended and blocked him on Snapchat.According to the news release, Grinnell found the minor’s friend on TikTok and stated that unless the girl contacted him, he would post a video of her naked on TikTok.Grinnell then posted sexually explicit videos of the minor on TikTok. When a friend of the victim, who is also a minor, begged Grinnell not to post any additional videos, he…
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