Muhammad Zain Ul Abideen Rasheed charged with more than 100 ‘sextortion’ offences involving teen girls

A Parkwood man who allegedly pretended to be a teenage social media celebrity to befriend girls online before blackmailing them into performing sexual acts on camera has appeared in court. Muhammad Zain Ul Abideen Rasheed, 25, is facing more than 100 ‘sextortion’ charges after allegedly tricking 112 girls in various countries to strip and carry out sexually explicit acts and threatening to expose them to their friends and family. Police claim Mr Rasheed, who was pretending to be a 15-year-old boy, had befriended a 13-year-old girl in the US and began asking her sexually-explicit questions. The 25-year-old then allegedly sent the teenager screen shots of the chat that were edited to make it appear she had liked his sexual fantasies. He is then accused of threatening to send those screen shots to her family and friends if she did not take off her clothes and engage in sexual acts while he watched with others. Police allege Mr Rasheed used similar scenarios to force other young girls in other countries to provide him with sexually explicit images or videos. Officers from the WA Joint Anti Child Exploitation Team arrested Mr Rasheed this week after they were alerted by authorities in the US and Interpol about a man using social media to target young girls. A search was carried on Mr Rasheed’s home where officers seized several electronic devices including a mobile phone, computer hard drives and USBs. Following a review of the devices, police said they found more than 2000 images, most sexually explicit, of girls. AFP Detective Senior Constable Barry Duman, from WA JACET, said police were working with international law enforcement partners and the social media companies to try to identify all the girls targeted, to check on their welfare and provide them support. He said some of the evidence seized included text conversations and videos of the girls pleading for the man to leave them alone, detailing their distress, fear and humiliation. “This type of online exploitation and abuse is devastating and can cause life-long trauma,” Det Snr Const Duman said. “We will do everything in our power to ensure children are protected from predatory offending against their innocence.” Mr Rasheed is expected to appear in court again in December.

Muhammad Zain Ul Abideen Rasheed charged with more than 100 ‘sextortion’ offences involving teen girls

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