Former TRU student gets jail time for extorting young girls

Despite the warning, Weeks reached out to a 14-year-old on social media two months later. She lived in the United States and didn’t know him, but the conversation started casually and she told him she was 15.

Weeks started asking the victim for nude photographs, and when she denied him he began calling her degrading names until she eventually complied. The request for nude photographs turned into demanding for provocative, disturbing videos. He became more abusive in his demands, commanding her to hurt herself and saying she deserved it.

“She told him she had cut herself due to his behaviour towards her and that she just wanted him to leave her alone,” Rogers said in her decision. “She told him ‘I can’t take it anymore’ and ‘I just want to f—ing kill myself.’ She told him he ruined her life. None of this stopped Mr. Weeks.”

For this interaction, Weeks was charged with one count of possession of child pornography.

While investigators tried to narrow down who was behind the messages to the first victim, Weeks made contact with 13 other young girls.

His conversations with these girls were similar to those with the first victim — demanding nude photographs or videos and threatening to release the images online if they didn’t comply with his requests.

Other conversations included demanding inappropriate voice recordings from them, and even offering to pay one 14-year-old girl to meet up with him.

The victims ranged in age from 12 years old to 26 years old, and several of them contacted police after their interactions with him.

Weeks used aliases to communicate with some of the girls, and in certain instances he threatened to release photoshopped images of them online.

His communications with most of the victims fell under two counts of criminal harassment, while other events led to two counts of extortion.

Rogers said in her decision that Weeks has expressed his remorse for his offences, and has made “considerable” rehabilitative efforts. Weeks never completed his program at TRU, but has been employed since charges were laid against him.

Crown asked for a total sentence of three years in jail for Weeks, while defence argued for a 90-day intermittent sentence, followed by a 21-month conditional sentence order, followed by three years of probation.

Overall, Rogers sentenced Weeks to 18 months in jail, followed by a six-month conditional sentence order which would include three months of house arrest. After he serves those sentences, Weeks will be on a three-year probation.

During the conditional sentence order, he can’t have any contact or be near any of the victims, have no contact or communication with anyone under 18 years old, not use drugs or alcohol, and not own, possess or use any device capable of accessing the internet.

Many of these conditions also apply to Weeks’s probation order.

Weeks must register as a sex offender for life.

The full details of Weeks’s offences can be found here, but be aware that some are graphic and disturbing.

by Ashley Legassic

Former TRU student gets jail time for extorting young girls

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