All language subtitles for Teen.Predator.Online.Killer.S01E03

This programme deals with suicide
and sexual abuse,

and contains scenes which
some viewers may find disturbing

He seemed to be awake at all times,
didn't he?

When did he sleep?

It was clearly an obsession
with him.

Blackmail.

Sexual offences.

Intimidation.

Thousands of victims.

Hundreds of thousands of images.

We had 198 charges.

Only a small sample
of what McCartney had done.

The absolute tip of the iceberg.

He's not just a catfish,
he's a sexual predator.

Compulsive.

More children were being identified
all the time.

Police had this imperative
to identify the children,

to protect them.

But we can't prosecute a case
with thousands of victims.

It's unmanageable for
our court system.

So we focus on around about
60 victims,

getting what happened
to them fully evidenced.

The case was listed for a hearing
in court.

All of my focus was on that date -
the 22nd of January, 2021.

If he pleads guilty,
that's really the end of the case.

I came into work on the
Thursday morning, the day before,

opened my laptop.

An email came through from
the police that changed everything.

Hundreds of victims worldwide.

Those figures are going to rise.

My heart dropped out of my chest
and I just felt, like,

my whole world collapsing.

This is 232,000
first generation images.

One of the cops in America
found a obituary page...

..for a young girl
that's taken her own life.

Cimarron. She was a 12-year-old
from West Virginia.

Alex created another folder.

There's a number of victims
that he's placed in there.

The 12-year-old from West Virginia
that took her own life

is within that folder.

I'm now looking at the conversation
between

this 12-year-old and McCartney,
and I've obviously got the time

and date that it's happened.

Straight away, I can see some
of those were on the same day...

..that this little girl
has killed herself.

There was two days
that they engaged in conversation.

The 7th of May
and then the 10th of May.

It was two interactions.

There was one, and then a couple
of days later,

there was a second interaction,
and, um...

..he got her to do horrendous,
horrendous things.

Just before 5.00 in the morning,
he says,

"OK, you need sleep and you've done
well, so I'll delete the stuff

"and you can block me if you wish.

"You've done good,
so I'll treat you nicely."

As though he's kind of like
praising her.

And then three days later,
Alex is back online.

"Basically, I felt like you made me
rush at the end the other night.

"So if you want me to delete
the stuff, then I want to play

"one more time,
so stay on the chat."

He was trying to get her to perform
sexual acts and she refused.

And she refused again and again.

The requests continue.

And then 23.49, that's when
she makes the threat of self-harm.

And then he starts with,
"Good luck and goodbye.

"You'll see what happens by tonight.

"I tried to be nice by offering
to delete them for you,

"but you don't want that."

No reply.

He gives her ten seconds to respond.

No reply.

"That's final, then. Goodbye."

And then she's like, "Why? Please."

And then it's like,
"No, you ain't going to obey.

"I gave you your options.

"30 seconds to decide."

And then he counts down.

30, 20, 15, 10, 0.

"Time's up. I'm posting. Bye."

And then one of the most
vindictive things I've seen

across all these conversations
that I've read, across all

these hundreds and hundreds
of children throughout the world,

what he actually threatens then -

"The first person I'm going
to send all this to is..."

Actually her father, and he
specifically names her father.

And she's, like, panicked then.

"He should see the pics first,
I think."

"No, please. I'll obey."

She's panicking.

Two and a half minutes later,
he sent her three messages.

"OK, then take the pic
I asked you to do.

"You have one minute."
And then he waits.

We don't hear from the young
12-year-old again.

And at the point he is typing,

"A minute is up"...

..we know that this 12-year-old
little girl,

she has taken her own life.

And this is the point
where her sister,

her nine-year-old sister has found
her, and she's ringing 911.

SIRENS WAIL

Her sister heard the sound,

and she thought it was, like,
a balloon or something.

She really didn't know what it was.

Uh-huh.

She had deleted a lot off her phone.

They went looking for information.
Reasons.

And a lot had been deleted off of it.

My son Ben, he said,
"Cimarron is in the hospital."

And I said, "How come?"

Thinking maybe she broke her arm
or whatever, you know.

He said, "She's been shot."

So we went and got sister
and we go to the hospital.

We went in, the surgeon's standing
there and talking to me and said,

"There's nothing there."

You know, so we say goodbye
to Cimarron

because there's no doubt
that she's gone.

Cimarron was the first girl
in my family since 1959.

She was always game for everything.
If you wanted to go go-kart racing,

if you were willing to do it,
she was willing to do it with you.

Adventurous.

Ben, her dad, used to tease her
about the gap in her teeth.

This one, we were picking at her,
friendly,

because of her Roy Orbison glasses,

and she started wearing
this bright red lipstick.

But she always had a smile.

Out of all my photographs,
that's the one I like the best.

And I keep that one around a lot.

Cimarron would have been 13 in July.

And so she has
bright red lipstick on,

getting into that stage of her life,
to be a teenager.

She almost was.

This is the Sunday we took her home
before her passing.

This was their woods at their house.

Why?

"Why" was the biggest question.

Why?

The investigating people,

you know, they went to the school
and talked to everybody

and nobody had any...thing concrete
to say.

It just wasn't her to...do it.

So that was... That was the hardest,
was not understanding why she would.

We just spent so much time together
that it just did not fit

the facts of our life.

We needed a lot of information
about this child.

Has McCartney caused this death?

Can we hold him accountable?

Can we prosecute him
for manslaughter?

McCartney was going to already get
a huge sentence,

but it was the principle.

We had to try and get justice
for this child.

We had to do the investigation first
before there could be any decision,

so we went to America and carried
out a manslaughter investigation.

We managed to see
the police officers.

We managed to get into
the crime scene.

We managed to find the bullet hole
in the crime scene.

And West Virginia is a place
where guns are really common.

It's a big hunting sort of place.

And I spoke to many people
whose children

were comfortable around firearms.

American police investigated
her suicide.

They had no idea,

had no idea that any of this
had happened to her.

Her family had no idea that
any of this had happened to her.

They needed to know,

so we had taken two specially trained
family liaison officers with us,

and it was their job to go
into the family home

and explain to them the reasons
why Cimarron had taken her life.

PEGGY THOMAS: Cimarron was...happy,
you know, and everything.

So there was no indication to us
in any way.

So it's like, did we miss something,
you know?

Was there something underlying there
that we didn't know about?

And so...

So it gave us an answer
to what we had been wanting,

you know, a reason why
she took her life.

We were all really keen
to understand and know

what mum had said.
How mum was, how dad was.

Erm...and then...

..we learned that her dad,

his life had basically unravelled.

I don't know the order here.

He's got all different school
pictures, different ages there.

He was so young then.

SHE CHUCKLES
Was a soldier through and through.

Ben and Cimarron had
a very close relationship.

They did a lot together.

And Ben tried to train her
in basic things.

Ben would take her out
to the garage, work on the vehicle,

the lawnmower, you know, whatever.

He taught his girls young
how to use weapons, you know,

took them to the range, taught them
about how you take care of a weapon,

where you keep it,
and they both could shoot.

It was January 2020.

His mental health deteriorated.

He started drinking.

Ben just missed her.

He just kind of withdrew and...

Deteriorated slowly.

Because he couldn't deal with
all of it.

Got down just about to skin
and bones.

It was just... The bulk was gone.

The interest was gone.

The attitude was different.

And he went out
and took his own life.

And, uh...

So from the tragedy of Cimarron,

we've now got the added tragedy
of her father,

directly linked, and as a result of
the death of his daughter.

Alex McCartney...

..has caused all this trauma
to families around the world.

And to kids who have never, ever

even told their parents
what's happened.

We couldn't hold Mr McCartney
accountable

for this child's father's death,

but morally,
I think he was responsible.

We had to try and get justice
for this child.

There are three things
that we have to prove

to get him found guilty
of manslaughter.

First is that he committed
an unlawful act.

The second, we have to prove
it's a dangerous act

that any reasonable person
would foresee could lead to a risk

of physical harm to the victim.

And the third thing we have to prove
is that it caused her death.

One of the things that we have
to prove from the manslaughter case

was that he foresaw the risk
to the 12-year-old.

Did McCartney foresee what the
consequences of his actions were?

The examinations of the different
devices disclosed

some really important stuff for us
as the investigation team,

and was particularly relevant
in the case we were building.

Having read the stuff that he did
to those children,

and having seen the pictures, the
videos, it wasn't an uncommon thread

throughout his offending,
where young children

would have threatened to harm
themselves because of the pressure

and the stress that he was
putting them under.

We know that the young girl
from West Virginia killed herself,

and she killed herself
on the 10th of May.

Um...this 14-year-old is about
two weeks before the conversation

with the 12-year-old
from West Virginia.

And within this conversation,
she actually goes on camera.

"I'm going to kill myself,"
is what she says.

22.49, they're her words.

"Please, please, please.

"I'm sorry, I can't.

"I feel like I'm drowning."

And then he says no, she makes one
more threat to self-harm.

And then his response is, "IDC,"

which I think means "I don't care."
Yeah. Yeah.

That is absolutely typical
of his response to all these kids.

And then after that is when
she slices her arm on video

and sends that video to him.

I could see that she'd threatened
the self-harm, and his response is,

"I don't care."

And then she's gone on
and self-harmed.

So he knows that children
are threatening to self-harm,

that if he doesn't stop, there's
a real risk that they're going to

go on and do that,
because that's what she did.

He can foresee the consequences
of his actions.

It was a moment of - he's here,
we've got him.

I built this case now
for this manslaughter.

To have a suspect, McCartney,
in Northern Ireland

and a victim in another
jurisdiction -

first of its kind, certainly
within the UK. Pretty big.

Looking forward to being able
to tell all the victims

their images are going to
be destroyed.

Never going to hit the internet.

So the comfort that that will
bring to them,

it'll be great to be able
to tell them.

Hello. Welcome to BBC News.

You join us with breaking news.

A life sentence for
the online predator

who drove one of his young victims
to kill herself.

One of the world's most prolific
online abusers, Alexander McCartney,

has been sentenced to life
with a minimum of 20 years.

As well as manslaughter,
McCartney has pleaded guilty

to charges including
59 counts of blackmail

and 70 counts of inciting children
to engage in sexual activity.

It's hard to think of a sexual
deviant who poses more risk

than this man.

I'm just going to warn you that
details that we will be hearing

following this breaking news
are upsetting,

so I'm just making that
absolutely clear

before we go any further
with this breaking news story.

This was one of the most depraved,
distressing, and prolific cases

of child sexual abuse
that we have ever seen

in the Public Prosecution Service.

Cimarron Thomas was one of thousands
of victims of McCartney's abuse

around the world.

He has caused immeasurable damage
to children and their families.

To me, she was the greatest thing
walking, but...

You know, I'll live with what I had.

You know, we were fortunate
to have those years.

Right?
Right.

And so we celebrate her life.

Ben would have... I can't say
how he would have handled it.

I think it would have given him
a reason to know why.

In his mind,
I think that would have helped...

..him accept it
maybe a little better.

But we'll never know that.

No.

WIND CHIMES TINKLE

You know, I don't know if I'll ever
know why he did the things he did,

or he is the way he is.

I don't think why matters.

And I hate everything
about the situation.

It's a nightmare to think about,

and I'm just glad that
no-one else is going to get hurt.

I don't think I'll ever
not be angry.

I've nothing to say to him.

It won't change what he did.

Nobody should have got hurt.

Being catfished is such, like,
a light term for this situation.

Like, to me, being catfished is,
like, you're on a Tinder profile

and your pictures look different
than what you look like in real life.

Like, that is not this.

People have lost their lives
over this.

I reported him and he got caught.

Speak out, because you truly never
know the magnitude of the situation

you're dealing with.

It's, like, seven years later.

I spoke out, and talking about it
definitely helps.

Like, I like who I am nowadays.

I know his name.

I've learned a lot more about him
and how he operated.

I know he's behind bars.

There were some tears and,
you know, hugs from both my parents.

It felt good to have that support
from them.

You know, everybody's got a phone,
everybody's got a computer.

You know, you can't find
a house anywhere these days

that is not internet connected.

That's just a limitless possibility
for somebody who wants to do harm.

Think of it as strangers
showing up at your door,

would you just let them in your house
whenever they knocked?

Well, that's exactly what
we're doing with the internet.

We're allowing strangers
into our house.

If you have children with devices

and they have access to the
internet, then you need to

supervise that access
and talk to your children about

how to keep themselves safe online,

and that if something does happen
to them, they can talk to you.

You don't have to suffer in silence.

There are people there to help you,
erm, and people do overcome it.

I think it's important that children
that are being violated online

realise that they can come forward
and open up a conversation.

I think that's really important.

We really need to get the message
out to children that

you can't trust people online,

that you don't know where people
are abusing children online.

They may hear about this case and
realise you can be held accountable.

So would that give people
pause for thought?

Well, we really hope so.

A lot of times,
when we get a complaint,

they've done what they thought
was right.

They delete it and get rid of
everything because they're scared.

Can't blame them for that.
But ultimately,

from a law enforcement standpoint,
that's the best evidence.

The quicker we have the information,
the quicker we can act on it.

People have a really hard time
talking about sex crimes,

but I think when it's in this big
of a magnitude,

you need to use big words.

It is a sex crime
and it is horrible.

And that's not something
people should take lightly.