An eighteen-year-old has been jailed after blackmailing a fourteen-year-old girl into giving him her family jewellery or facing a video of her abuse being released on Facebook.
Mohammed Luqman, from Balsall Heath, is accused of sexually exploiting the victim over a period of months. The student recorded her being sexually abused and threatened to release said videos on Facebook unless she stole for him. After handing over her family jewellery as well as her iPhone, the student revealed the incident to teachers who got the police involved.
Luqman was arrested in early 2015 and plead guilty to two counts of blackmail in October 2016 for blackmailing two girls. He has since been sentenced to Birmingham Youth Court where he is to serve six months of youth custody for his two offences. In addition, he was made to pay a £20 surcharge for each victim and is to stay away from both victims for the next five years.
Many are accusing the courts of being too lenient on the Luqman, who was sixteen at the time of the offences. Furthermore, Luqman has not been charged for any sexual offences. The fourteen-year-old victim’s mother has lambasted the police for a series of blunders, which included officers losing a phone holding the abuse footage and not questioning Luqman for five months. The police have blamed delays on the victim for refusing to initially give a statement.
The victim’s mother said:
“It’s been horrible. When my daughter found out that no-one was being charged with any sexual offence, she was crying and screaming.
“My daughter said she would be taken to parks and was then told to get undressed. Yet she felt that police have not really believed her throughout.
“Barnado’s is helping her as is her support worker, while the neighbourhood police have been around every other week because she has been scared that people are following her and sending messages through social media.
“She has gone downhill, become a person who does not want to go out, she is isolated at home.
“She used to love going to school and her friends coming over and going out and all that has gone.
“We were kept apart from the second family throughout the case. But we met them on the day he was sentenced and the second girl’s Dad was very angry too. Luqman has ruined two lives.”
