Warning: this story discusses suicide and may be triggering. Call or text 988 to reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.

As she clutches a letter from her son written in 2015, Cindy George remembers Jake’s loving, nurturing way – she recounts how he was a true friend to everyone.

“He was just the kind of kid that was just giving of himself and, and caring,” Cindy says. The letter she’s holding begins with “Dear Mom, I love you so much.”

His next words – unthinkable.

‘I wish I could live with what I did’

“I wish I could live with what I did,” Cindy reads tearfully. “I know that this time will be hard, but I need you to continue on with your life. I hope you don’t think too bad of me for what I did. I know this is sudden, but the hell I went through Sunday through Thursday was too much for me to handle. I love you, dear mom.”

The 21-year-old was being blackmailed by scammers overseas. It started as an innocent conversation with whom he thought was a young woman and turned into what is now widely called “sextortion.”

“This evil conversation that started with trying to get him to send a picture. And I’m sure it had to have taken a lot of talking him into it because he was a very private person. He wasn’t even the type that would take his shirt off in public. They got him to take just one picture,” Cindy explains. “After he sent it, they said, now we’ve got you and you’re going to pay, or we’re going to ruin your life.”

The scammers manipulated and threatened Jake that they would expose him. Jake would send hundreds of dollars for four painstaking, stressful days. Then they threatened his family.

“I think he thought, ‘this is the only way I can stop. If I’m not here.’ And at one point they say, ‘well if you don’t have any money, you better, you better be looking for a way to kill yourself.’ I mean, it was just torment, pure torment,” Cindy says.

Jake died by suicide at the age of 21. His scammers – believed to be overseas in a Philippines call center – were never caught.

The Prosecution Problem

“It’s still very difficult to investigate these crimes and then also to prosecute them,” explains Sete Aulai, Utah’s Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Commander.

Since these sextortion criminals are often overseas, U.S. law enforcement work with federal partners who may be able to track the criminals down. Yet at the state level, they are in control of one potential avenue – to follow the money to the American-based money mule. “The person who’s receiving the money, where these kids are sending it to, or these the victims are sending it to, is likely going to be within the United States. Because to create a transaction account or a money account, you have to have an American email, an American account bank account or something like that. And that’s fairly easy for us in ICAC to write search warrants on and get results from the companies.”

ICAC By the Numbers

Aulai and his team have a large caseload. In 2023, Utah received about 6,000 CyberTips from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. In 2024, that number went up to 6,800 – a 13% increase and the task force is on pace to exceed that in 2025.

“Sextortion occurs on all social media platforms,” Aulai says.  “We still have crimes of possession, viewing and distribution of CSAM (child sexual abuse material), but the sextortion cases, it’s right up there with possession.”

Part of the Attorney General’s Office, Utah ICAC serves the entire state – a population of 3.4 million people with over 200 affiliated investigators in agencies scattered throughout the state.

“It’s a whole different level on how to investigate these types of investigations. We look into IP addresses, phone numbers, emails etc. These types of investigations are not your typical police investigations. They are often very complex,” explains the Utah ICAC Assistant Commander Will Chow.

Digital evidence is the most powerful way to hold perpetrators accountable and they invest in a technology, like Cellebrite, to make the cases as solid as possible.

“Not only are we in the business to find those who are perpetuating the demand for CSAM, we’re also looking for things that have been produced,” says Aulai. “And getting into the phone, we can see all the pictures, all the videos that are stored on the phone, and we can make the determination of, ‘Is this a real child? Is it an identified child? Is it (an image) from an identified (image) series that, that we know just circulates?’ Um, all of that plays into it. It’s super, super important for us to get into these phones.”

And they get some help from furry friends – two K9 Officers who double as therapy dogs: Flash and Echo. The Electronic Storage Detection (ESD) K9s help the ICAC task force on search warrants, finding the evidence perpetrators are often trying to hide. The highly skilled K9s are trained to sniff out a specific chemical that’s used in electronics. Flash has been with the task force since 2021, while Echo has been with the task force since 2023. Both ESD K9s have been instrumental in finding numerous hidden electronic devices. Utah currently has four total ESD K9s, two at the Utah Attorney General’s Office and two others with ICAC-affiliated police agencies.

A Calling to Help and Educate

“These cases changed my whole perspective on police work,” says Chow. “When you’re working child crimes and you’re, you know, putting pedophiles away, you’re saving children, there’s nothing like it. I will retire here or they’ll kick me out of here. One of the two.”

“Just like Cindy said, ‘if we save one, we’ve done our job,’” says Michelle Busch-Upwall, who heads up education for the task force and travel around the state to talk with kids and their families. “Kids are innocent. They’re our futures. We want to do everything we can to make sure they’re safe.”

As painful as it is to recount her beloved son’s life cut short due to evil people sitting a half a world away, Cindy shares his story as often as she can – helping with Utah ICAC educational sessions.

“She makes a huge impact to people. And I think that that’s the goal, to make this impact and make people aware of what’s happening out there,” says Busch-Upwall.

Michelle often shares NCMEC’s “No Escape Room” which helps educate people on the dangers of sextortion and how easily it can happen to anyone. Aulai and his team are committed to investigating the crime of sexual extortion, including the act of threatening to distribute counterfeit intimate images. They work diligently and vigorously to find those who prey on children online, all while educating the public about the dangers of the internet.

“Taking your life isn’t the answer. We can work through it,” Aulai adds. “Yeah, it sucks that those pictures and those videos are out there, but we can overcome that, and time will heal.”

Cindy’s hope is that sextortion education is required curriculum in Utah and beyond because she needs other parents to know – no one is immune.

“Don’t believe and don’t think that this wouldn’t happen to your child. Because I know from personal experience that a great kid can be a victim of this. If you’re in the middle of this right now, don’t take your life because of it. Tell someone. If Jake would’ve just told someone, he would’ve just come to me, I would’ve helped him.”

Simply call or text 988 to reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.