A 14-year-old girl found herself in the middle of a lurid game of emotional blackmail while in an online chat room on New Year's Day.
She contacted her mother, who contacted the Orange County Sheriff's Department.
The incident took place about 6 p.m. The girl was online when she began chatting socially with an unknown male. According to the OCSD's blotter, the man steered the chat toward a sexual nature and began cutting himself on his arm, working his way upward with a series of small incisions. He threatened to kill himself but would stop, he said, only if the girl sent him nude photos of herself.
The man was streaming photos of himself performing the self-mutilation, according to the blotter report.
"It was an online social chat, not sexual, but the male suspect took it in that direction," said Lt. Brian Schmutz, chief of police services in Rancho Santa Margarita. "She didn’t go along with it. She told her parents who called us.
"She didn’t know the suspect, and this should serve as a cautionary tale as you don’t know who you’re communicating with online."
Judging the by the video evidence, Schmutz said the man made small lacerations moving up his arm toward his shoulder. He cited an ongoing investigation for not providing details about contact with the man.
The call was made Tuesday, 5:57 p.m., from the 100 block of Pasto Rico..
