Indian Student Jailed 30 Years for Grooming 70 Girls Online

A 27-year-old Indian student who groomed at least 70 young girls online by posing as a white British teenager and manipulated them into sending sexually explicit videos and images of themselves has been sentenced to 30 years in prison at Chester Crown Court. Bilal Kazi, who was studying at the University of Chester before later moving to Birmingham, targeted victims aged between 10 and 17 across a four-year period spanning August 2021 to August 2025. The sophisticated predator used popular social media applications including Snapchat, Wink and Roblox to ensnare his victims, convincing them they were in genuine romantic relationships with a boy named "Reece" before demanding progressively more intimate content and threatening to leak the material when they refused. Daily Dazzling Dawn understands that Kazi must serve a minimum of 20 years behind bars before becoming eligible for parole, after which he will remain on licence for a further eight years. He has also been placed on the sex offenders register for life.

The court heard how Kazi constructed an elaborate web of deceit to lure his victims, often using the fake name "Reece" and providing a false photograph of a boy who has never been identified to aid his deception. He would initiate contact on platforms popular among children and teenagers, presenting himself as a 14-year-old white British teenage boy, and then gradually build what appeared to be a romantic relationship. Once trust was established, Kazi would demand that his victims send him progressively more intimate photographs and videos of themselves. When any of the girls expressed reluctance, he would manipulate them by claiming it was "what people do when they love each other," exploiting their emotional vulnerability and naivety. Daily Dazzling Dawn learned that some victims were as young as 13 when Kazi first contacted them, with one telling the court he had taken her "innocence away" and expressing hope that "one day I can get on with my life."

The predatory nature of Kazi's offending escalated when victims refused to comply with his demands. The court heard how he would threaten to "leak" images that had already been sent to him or that he had recorded covertly on Snapchat, threatening to share them with their friends and family. In some cases, Kazi hacked into victims' social media accounts, distributed the content to their friends and published the pictures publicly on social media platforms. In one chilling exchange, a victim told Kazi she felt "uncomfortable" sharing explicit photographs of herself and said she did not want to do it again. Kazi replied "That's fine w me" before revealing to the victim that he had a secret "back up" of images she had already sent him, demonstrating the calculated and manipulative nature of his offending. In another exchange over Snapchat, Kazi posed as "Reece" to ask for photographs of a victim in her underwear before sending a follow-up message asking the victim to share her live location with him on the app.

The investigation into Kazi's crimes began after a victim came forward to Derbyshire Police in December 2021. The victim explained that she started speaking to Kazi on Snapchat when she was 13, believing him to be the same age. In May 2022, the investigation was passed to Cheshire Constabulary, which said 180 possible victims had been identified in the initial investigation. Kazi had left Chester and the university by that point but was later arrested at Heathrow Airport when he was re-entering the country on 21 July 2023. He was subsequently charged with 39 offences and pleaded guilty in July 2026 to 37 of the charges, with two left to lie on file. West Midlands Police has also charged Kazi with a further eight offences committed while he was on police bail for the Cheshire investigation, and Cheshire Police confirmed these offences were considered as part of his overall sentence.

In a personal impact statement read out at Chester Crown Court, one victim said she had struggled with anxiety because Kazi had "taken away a sense of privacy and security." She told the court: "I am doing my best to move forward but the effects are still with me. The harm caused is not limited to the time events took place - they continue to affect my daily life." Daily Dazzling Dawn understands that some of the victims had attempted suicide, struggled with anxiety and developed eating disorders as a result of Kazi's abuse. One victim, who was 13 years old when Kazi first contacted her, said he took her "innocence away" and expressed her hope that "one day I can get on with my life."

Judge Stephen Everett delivered a damning assessment of Kazi's character and offending, describing him as a sexual predator who took advantage of "what appears to be a lack of proper security on social media sites." He told the court: "It is incomprehensible to me why any person would do what you did to those little girls. This was bad enough, but when one learns of all the other images you demanded for your deviant sexual desires, we will never know how many victims there were. Children who believed they were safe in their own homes - and by your gross misuse of social media - you took away all of that safety, all of that comfort." The judge said it was difficult to find any mitigating factors and expressed doubt about Kazi's remorse. "You are a very dangerous person," Judge Everett declared. "In a sophisticated way, you got into the minds of young people and got them to do things that were totally alien to them." Speaking about one victim, he said: "She won't look back on her childhood with any great pleasure - she will look on it totally blighted at what this fiend did to her. These are not just pictures on a computer, these are young lives that have been blighted."

Det Con Georgia Hughes, from Cheshire Police, said Kazi had not shown any remorse for his crimes. "The girls targeted by Kazi were young and vulnerable," she said. "For many, their interactions with him were their first experience of what they believed to be a romantic relationship. Exploiting that trust, Kazi manipulated them into believing that his behaviour was normal. Many lived in constant fear of what he would do if they failed to comply with his demands, and some have carried that fear with them for years. What should have been important formative years have instead been overshadowed by the trauma of Kazi's abuse." Speaking on online safety, Sgt Ross Peel said the force's message to parents was to "speak to your children and take an interest in the apps and platforms they are using." He added: "The potential for online offending is vast, and offenders can target children from anywhere in the world. By educating yourselves and your children about online safety and the risks associated with communicating with people they do not know online, you can help protect them." Daily Dazzling Dawn understands that the case represents one of the most extensive online grooming investigations in recent British criminal history, with authorities acknowledging that the true number of victims may never be fully known.