Police Say Keansburg Man Lured Girl, 14, On Snapchat, Abused Her
KEANSBURG, NJ — Police say a 40-year-old Keansburg man met and seduced a 14-year-old Louisiana girl over Snapchat, manipulating her into sending him sexual photos of herself and even convinced her to carve his initials into her leg.
Jason Berry, 40, of Keansburg, was arrested June 18 and charged with manufacturing and distributing child pornography, second-degree sex assault, child abuse and theft by extortion.
Berry was arrested as part of a massive statewide child porn sting New Jersey State Police conducted in the past six months. State Police and the attorney general say incidents of online child sex abuse and online child luring dramatically increased during the COVID lockdown, as more teens, children and adults were online.
Aberdeen and Union Beach men were arrested in the sting as well.
Police say Berry first met the 14-year-old Louisiana girl on Snapchat. New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal described the teen as "vulnerable" and said it only took Berry "a very short period of time, a few weeks" to allegedly convince her to send him naked pictures of herself engaging in various sex acts.
Police say he then convinced the girl to carve his initials into her legs and tricked the girl into revealing her mother's phone number. He then sent those images to her mother, all to humiliate her, police said.
The Attorney General called the alleged crimes "heinous."
March through July of 2020 saw as much as a 50 percent increase in tips to New Jersey's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, compared to the same time period in 2019.
“Predatory conduct against children is up as much as 50 percent during COVID as homebound children, starved for outside contact, spend more time on their devices,” said Attorney General Grewal. "And opportunistic sexual predators target them."
Also arrested in the sting was Loic Atse, 18, a college student from Aberdeen, arrested July 23 and charged with third-degree possession of child pornography.
And Michael Gilpin, 42, a pipe fitter from Union Beach was arrested July 26 and charged with third-degree possession of child pornography.
Adults can find and groom children on apps such as Kik, Skout, Grindr, Whisper, Omegle, Tinder, Chat Avenue, Chat Roulette, Wishbone, Live.ly, Musical.ly, Paltalk, Yubo, Hot or Not, Down and Tumblr.
Arrests have also been made involving the gaming apps Fortnite, Minecraft and Discord.
Click here to get Patch emails so you don't miss important local news. Download the Patch app here.
Follow Middletown Patch on Facebook. Have a news tip? Email the Middletown Patch reporter, Carly.baldwin@patch.com
This article originally appeared on the Middletown Patch