Northern Ireland lorry driver Christie Adam Bradley avoids jail after finding sexual pictures of man online and sending them to his family

Christie Adam Bradley received a four-month suspended sentence for distributing the explicit material and then telling the victim it would take “five grand” for him to stop.

The 32-year-old of Milewater Drive in Newtownabbey, admitted charges of harassment, sending menacing messages via an electronic communications network, and disclosing private sexual photographs.

Belfast Magistrates’ Court heard that Bradley targeted the man in June last year after identifying him from images he had posted on a Twitter account.

Screenshots of the victim’s photos were sent to his mother and other family members, friends and his Facebook business page.

With Bradley operating a pseudonym social media account, the man exchanged messages with him in an attempt to find out who he was and what he wanted.

“He requested that the user of the account stop sending messages and asked him what it would take for him to stop,” a prosecutor said.

“The person replied ‘five grand donated to men’s mental health’.”

The court heard that the victim’s mother was distressed at receiving messages which contained explicit messages of her son and referred to her home address.

The man’s sister also had to update her security measures as members of the family described how they lived in fear.

Police inquiries with Facebook established that an email address associated with the pseudonym account was linked to the defendant.

Bradley was arrested last September on suspicion of blackmail, harassment, and sending electronic communications with intent to cause distress or anxiety.

During interviews he admitted sending the messages, claiming he thought it had been funny after working out the identity of the Twitter account.

“He stated that he regretted it now and if he could make things right he would,” the Crown lawyer added. “In relation to asking for the £5,000 he stated that it was just a throwaway comment, he never intended to blackmail the victim.”

Defence barrister Rachael McCormack described the offences as “pretty mean”.

“He just didn’t seem to appreciate the consequences of his actions at the time,” she told the court. “He was sitting behind a computer screen, he thought it was funny and he now realises that it absolutely was not.”

Ms McCormack added that her client’s wife is “angry and ashamed” at his behaviour.

Based on Bradley’s guilty pleas, District Judge Anne Marshall suspended the four month prison term for two years.

She told him: “I do not understand your motivation. You didn’t even know this person who put some photographs up on the internet, obviously not intending that somebody would find them and send them to his (family) and put them on his business page.

“His mother and sister are very, very distressed and horrified by the whole thing.”