Swedish courts convicted a 41-year-old man in Sweden, and sentenced him to 10 years in prison for raping 27 minors in three different countries - without ever having met the victims.
Bjorn Samstrom, who lived in Uppsala, north of Stockholm, was found guilty of coercing 26 girls and one boy living in the U.S., Canada, and Britain to perform sex acts in front of their web cams while he watched. If his victims didn't comply, he threatened them saying that he would post their photos on porn sites or kill their relatives.
Most of his victims were under the age of 15. The sexual acts included Samstrom in asking them to remove their clothes and penetrate themselves with their fingers or objects. Some were even forced to involve other children or pets. Samstrom was also convicted of child pornography possession because he saved recordings of his victims, according to the court’s written ruling.
The online rapes were reported to have happened between the year 2015 and early 2017.
This case was the first conviction of "online rape" against a man who preyed on children over the internet. Samstrom’s 20-day trial was held behind closed doors to protect the victims’ identities.
One of the prosecutors involved in the case, was Annika Wennerström. She said that the case was "really challenging the court" because the rape conviction occurred over the internet.
"It’s only the sexual predator’s imagination that sets the limits," Wennerström said. "The technology knows no limits. So we have to adapt our mindset to, ‘What can a rape be?’ We say a rape can be different things. You don’t always have to have the textbook case of a physical attack or physical coercion."
This international case puts a spotlight of how sextortion is under-studied but is quickly becoming a growing form of sexual violence.
Europol describes how victims of online sexual abuse, specifying that risk factors include significant use of social networks, a poor knowledge of online security practices, and ignorance of the illegality of such actions.
Besides a 10 year sentence in prison, the court also ordered Samstrom to pay damages to victims who have been identified and claimed compensation, totaling 1.1 million kronor.
The case was unprecedented. But it was processed in Sweden where according to the law, rape does not have to involve intercourse.
