Sylmar man arrested and charged with extortion in connection with sexually explicit photos of local girls on Instagram – Daily News

LOS ANGELES – A 23-year-old Sylmar man was arrested Tuesday on charges of using Instagram to promote sexually explicit photos of local girls for sale online, as well as threatening behavior and attempted extortion.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Alejandro Garcia Aranda is charged in federal court with each of promoting child pornography, distributing child pornography and sending threatening messages with the intent to extort money.

According to the indictment, in April and May 2020, Aranda used the Instagram name “valleyhoezzz818” with the self-declared goal of targeting local girls attending schools in the San Fernando Valley.

It was not immediately known whether Aranda had hired a defense attorney.

Through Cash App, PayPal, Venmo and Zelle, Aranda allegedly received payments from customers who wanted to purchase sexually explicit content of the victims that he promoted and offered for sale on the Instagram account. After receiving and confirming payment through the Instagram account, Aranda allegedly sent a direct message to the customers and provided a link to a zip file containing the sexually explicit photos of his victims, according to federal prosecutors.

When the victims discovered that Aranda was promoting and distributing sexually explicit materials depicting them and asked him to stop and remove them, Aranda attempted to coax them to provide additional sexually explicit material, including by threatening to publish more photographs, the indictment states.

If convicted on all counts, Aranda would face between 15 and 30 years in prison for the promotion of child pornography, between five and 20 years in prison for the distribution of child pornography and up to two years in prison for the threat, prosecutors said.