Hart threatened to leak sexual videos and photos of the victim to her friends and family if her current boyfriend didn’t break up with her, according to the document. — Photo by Hitesh Choudhary on Unsplash
A 53-year-old man from Colorado was arrested after being accused of cyberstalking and threatening his ex-girlfriend, US federal officials said.
John B. Hart of Louisville is accused of pretending to be his former girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend online and cyberstalking her in 2022 while he was living in Hawaii, according to an Aug 28 news release by the US Department of Justice.
Hart posed as his ex-girlfriend’s former boyfriend and stalked her and her current boyfriend, officials said.
To deflect the attention away from himself, Hart also pretended to cyberstalk himself, the release said.
Posing as an ex-boyfriend, Hart encouraged the woman to hurt herself, told her that he had followed her and her current boyfriend while they were travelling and told her family he threatened to kill and kidnap her, according to the indictment.
He’s also accused of creating dating profiles, posing as the woman, and causing men to show up to her work looking to “engage in casual sexual encounters”, the document states.
Hart threatened to leak sexual videos and photos of the woman to her friends and family if her current boyfriend didn’t break up with her, according to the document.
Lawyer information was not immediately available for Hart.
Hart was arrested on Aug 25 and charged with three counts of cyberstalking and obstruction of justice, the news release said.
He is facing five years in prison for each count of cyberstalking and 20 years for obstruction of justice, federal officials said. – The Charlotte Observer/Tribune News Service
