Max Hollingsbee: Child sex predator from Lurgan who admitted 42 offences receives five-year sentence

Max Hollingsbee from Orient Circle, Lurgan will also be subjected to a Sexual Offences Prevention Order for 10 years, and will be on the Sex Offenders Register for the rest of his life.

Hollingsbee showed little to no reaction as Judge Donna McColgan told him at Craigavon Crown Court he will serve half the sentence in custody and half on licence.

Judge McColgan said his offending was aggravated because of the number of victims, the length of time the offending went on for, the fact he continued to offend even after his initial arrest and being on police bail and that he used one victim’s details to identify and exploit further victims.

It was also a factor that he used “a high degree of information technology knowledge for dangerous means,” said the judge, adding that even police experts “were unable to explain how he was able to hack some off these accounts”.

In September 2024, Hollingsbee entered guilty pleas to 28 charges and then a further 14 offences in March this year relating to offences committed against a total of 14 identified victims between June 10, 2021 and April 7, 2023.

Hollingsbee entered guilty pleas to a total of 42 offences including having indecent images of children including category A, B and C images of each victim; four charges of inciting or causing children to engage in sexual activity with children aged 13-16; four counts of unauthorised computer access and single offences of blackmail, sexual communication with a child and inciting a child to distribute an indecent image.

Outlining how Hollingsbee, previously a Belfast Met student, had been coercing children into sending him explicit images and then blackmailing them, Judge McColgan said the PSNI were first contacted about him due to a Surrey Police investigation in October 2022 when they were investigating a complaint regarding a 15-year-old girl.

She told police she had an online conversation with someone called Matt, claiming to be 16.

At his request, she sent images of herself in her underwear and topless with ‘Matt’ pestering her for more explicit images and passcodes to her Snapchat and the “for your eyes only” section of her Snapchat account.

She relented and shortly afterwards, “she received a video from Matt showing a computer screen containing downloads of explicit images from her Snapchats,” said the judge, adding the defendant sent her a message declaring: “You've seen what I can do. Want to talk business?”

Using her images, Hollingsbee then created multiple other Snapchat accounts, but police were able to identify the defendant and called at his home on November 11.

His mother said he had gone to the airport to fly to England to meet a girl and officers were able to intercept him at Belfast International Airport.

Freed on police bail to allow detectives to investigate the case, Judge McColgan said part of the conditions was that he had no access to social media but on February 12, 2023, “police conducting a bail check at his home observed a number of social media apps open on his devices”.

He claimed he needed them for college but that was disproved and Hollingsbee was freed again with a reminder of the importance of adherence.

The following month however, the PSNI were made aware of an ongoing Police Scotland investigation over reports that in October 2022, a 17-year-old girl had been contacted by a social media profile purporting to be a female.

This profile, using images from the first victim, sent the second victim explicit images of herself threatening that if she did not comply with demands the images would be sent around her school.

"She recognised the images as ones that she had taken when she was 14 years old and she recalled sending them to a select few people, including a boy called Max Hollingsbee from Ireland, who she had not communicated with him for some time,” said the judge.

Hollingsbee was re-arrested in April 2023 and during that search, police found another mobile phone which, when analysed, “it became evident that he was active on Instagram and TikTok…portraying himself as a female and a number of posts were of a sexual nature”.

"Further analysis of his devices revealed large quantities of indecent images of children and during the course of their investigation, police were able to identify some, but not all of the victims,” the judge said.

Other victims told a similar story of being contacted through social media and having exchanged images there were then coercive and manipulating threats to send more.

Judge McColgan said one victim was initially “catfished” by Hollingsbee but even after she called him out on it, the pair continued to have a relationship both online and with mutual visits in Lurgan and the north east of England.

"During the early stages of the relationship, he suggested that they would exchange passwords to their social media accounts as a sign of their mutual trust for each other,” the judge said, but instead, Hollingsbee used his access to obtain explicit images of the victim.

"It is particularly sinister that the defendant used this young lady, who apparently viewed herself as his girlfriend at the time, to get access to the victim’s younger sister and her younger sister's friend,” said Judge McColgan.

The judge outlined mitigating factors, including Hollingsbee’s previously clear record, his guilty pleas and expressions of remorse.

Judge McColgan imposed sentences amounting to 62 months to be served half in prison and half under licence conditions.

The judge also imposed a SOPO which puts conditions on where Hollingsbee can live, what devices he can have, how he accesses the internet and bars him from “loitering near child-centred facilities” and from forming new romantic relationships without verifiable disclosure.