The victims of a police officer who blackmailed more than 200 teenage girls into sending him explicit images have spoken of the trauma they experienced after being subjected to his crimes.
Lewis Edwards, 24, who groomed 210 girls aged between 10 and 16 on Snapchat between November 2020 and February 2023, was today jailed for life with a minimum term of 12 years.
The South Wales Police officer, who joined the force in January 2021, posed as a 14-year-old boy and forced his victims to make indecent videos and images of themselves, which he covertly recorded.
He then used the recordings to blackmail his victims into sending increasingly graphic and explicit images. He also sent videos of himself performing a sex act.
Some of the girls that were subject to his campaign of abuse told the court of how his crimes had affected them – with many self-harming, contemplating suicide, losing friends and left fearful of going out.
The court heard all but one of the victims were abused while he was a serving police officer, and he targeted one teenager just 17 days after meeting her as part of his duties.
Hellbound and Down 