A New York man who posted a sex video of a 16-year-old girl on the adults-only website OnlyFans has pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of distributing child pornography.
Matthew Richardson, 36, faces five to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine when he is sentenced Dec. 19. The plea agreement was reached in August.
Richardson’s attorneys and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of New York, which prosecuted the case, declined to comment until after the sentencing.
Richardson’s case was cited in a Reuters investigation in July, in which a complaint was made to police that child sexual abuse material had been shown on OnlyFans.
Richardson was arrested at a highway rest stop in Ohio in December 2022 after a fling with a New York teenager. The two met at a grocery store and began having sex. Shortly thereafter, Richardson recorded himself having sex with the girl. According to plea documents filed in the case, on November 9, 2022, he posted a child sexual abuse video on his OnlyFans account under the pseudonym Skylar Ravenwood.
“It was a nightmare,” a relative of the girl told Reuters, asking the person not to be named to protect the teenager’s identity. “She’s still not doing well.”
A Reuters investigation identified 30 complaints in US police and court records saying child sexual abuse material appeared on OnlyFans between December 2019 and June 2024. The investigation cited more than 200 explicit videos and images of children on the site, including some having oral sex with adults. small children
OnlyFans has not commented on Richardson’s case. After posting an underage sex video, her OnlyFans account remained available on the platform for more than a year and a half. By mid-June, the video with the girl appeared to have been removed. The account was shut down after Reuters asked OnlyFans about the matter.
OnlyFans says no children are allowed on its website and that it screens all content and immediately removes and reports any child sexual exploitation material. The company also says it can deactivate accounts that violate its rules.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
