A 23-year-old man was added to a minor's Snapchat using the “Quick Add” feature while the child was trying to obtain 100,000 points on the platform. He then sexually abused the 11-year-old girl.
An 11-year-old girl in Australia was hoping to achieve a high score on Snapchat, which is commonly known as a “Snap Score.”
Your “Snap Score” is determined by how much you use the app, how often you send snaps, and how frequently you receive them.
This is a common and unofficial “game” amongst young people who want to get tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of “points” on the app.
The girl, who was given the name April to protect her identity, added a 23-year-old man called Jai Clapp using Snapchat’s “quick add” feature.
This feature allows users to quickly and easily add new friends based on various criteria, such as who’s in their contact list, mutual friends, and other factors.
Clapp was then added to April’s friends list in order to reach this goal and beat her friend, The Guardian reports.
The man told April that he was only 17 years old, which may have made her feel more at ease.
Clapp groomed April over a 12-day period and then went on to sexually abuse her over the course of three separate meetings. The pair met in a local park in the town where the girl lived.
The 23-year-old was convicted of digital and penile penetration – digital penetration involves sending explicit images of a person’s genitalia with the intent to cause harm or distress, it is often called “internet penetration.”
However, digital penetration in Victoria refers to the use of digits (fingers and thumbs) which are then inserted into the victim without their consent.
The Guardian didn’t clarify which form of digital penetration it was.
This wasn’t Clapp's first offense, as he pleaded guilty and was sentenced for the abuse of April and another young girl, The Guardian reports.
Snapchat: a hotbed for predators
The social media platform has been in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons after stories continue to surface regarding the use of Snapchat to commit acts of violence against children.
Cybernews previously reported that internet celebrities like beauty influencer James Charles and former Mr Beast employee Ava Kris Tyson were allegedly having inappropriate relationships with minors via Snapchat.
Tyson was accused of communicating with a 13-year-old child when she was 20 years old, and she supposedly sent sexually suggestive messages to multiple minors via the social media platform.
Despite her denial of these allegations, she has apologized for her “past behavior” in a post on X.
YouTuber and make-up artist (MUA) James Charles has been accused of sending explicit images and requesting sexually explicit images of young fans via Snapchat.
Charles was publicly accused of sending lewd images and inappropriate messages to a then-16-year-old fan, Cosmopolitan wrote in an article promoting Charles’s return to Internet fame.
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