Woman arrested over alleged blackmail of local escort site users

Detectives in the Antrim area are appealing for more potential victims.

PA
Author: Sarah MckinleyPublished 14th Jul 2020
Last updated 15th Jul 2020

A woman has been arrested over allegations of blackmail involving users of an adult escort website.

The 31-year-old was arrested on suspicion of five counts of blackmail, and has since been released on police bail.

It comes after detectives in Antrim received a number of reports of online blackmail incidents involving users of a local adult escort web-page.

The allegations involved men who, after talking or texting with a woman, were threatened with details of their contact being disclosed to family and friends if they did not pay sums of money.

Detectives say there could be more people effected, who are too embarrassed to get in touch, so they're urging any more potential victims to step forward.

"It is believed that there are more victims who have not contacted police due to the sensitive or embarrassing nature of the incidents and detectives are appealing for them to contact police now,'' a PSNI statement says.

"This type of crime is taken extremely seriously and anyone coming to police with information can be reassured that they will be treated professionally and their information will be treated in confidence.''

Detectives in Antrim can be contacted on 101 or a report can be made online at www.psni.police.uk/makeareport.