Austin, Texas – A 21-year-old man has been sentenced to 292 months in prison for the sexual exploitation of multiple juvenile boys through various social media platforms. Tre Von Lamount Harris was found guilty of enticing and extorting his victims to engage in sexually explicit conduct, which he documented and transmitted.
Harris began his exploitative actions at the age of 16, where he impersonated a teenage girl named “Michelle” across several social media sites, including Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok. Under this false identity, he communicated with his victims using graphic and explicit language, pressuring them to produce and send him visual depictions of sexual acts.
Victims, believing they were interacting with a peer, created child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and shared it with Harris. Following this, he resorted to extortion, threatening to distribute the material to their friends and family unless they complied with his demands for payment, a threat that he unfortunately acted upon.
Harris was initially arrested by the Travis County Sheriff’s Office on May 31, 2022, facing charges of sexual assault and publishing invasive visual recordings. After being released on a $5,000 cash bond, he was permitted to continue attending high school. However, by December 2022, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) had received multiple CyberTip reports concerning CSAM linked to Harris’s accounts.
An extensive investigation led by the FBI commenced after these reports came to light, culminating in Harris’s federal arrest on May 21, 2024, at his high school.
U.S. Attorney Simmons emphasized the severity of Harris’s actions, stating, “Tre Von Harris will spend more than a decade of his young adult life behind bars because he hid behind a fake profile to humiliate and sexually exploit teenage boys for profit.” Simmons also highlighted the importance of parental involvement in children’s online activities to protect against such predators.
FBI San Antonio Special Agent in Charge Daniel Faith remarked that the sentence underscores the profound impact of Harris’s actions on his victims while asserting that the FBI and law enforcement will continue to pursue those who exploit children online.
The investigation was a collaborative effort led by the FBI, with Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Devlin in charge of the prosecution. This case is part of Project Safe Childhood, a national initiative aimed at combatting child sexual exploitation and abuse.
For further information about Project Safe Childhood, visit Justice.gov/PSC.
