The account is of an attractive girl named Dani.
That’s when everything changes.
Dani threatens to send the photo to his family and friends if he doesn’t pay $1,000.
Jordan tragically sees no way out and dies by suicide.
Jordan’s parents share his story in hopes of preventing similar tragedies.
I’m your host Bob Sullivan.
A warning about today’s episode, it includes extensive discussion of suicide.
And, uh, just basically opened myself up to question and answers.
There wasn’t a whole lot we were too concerned about.
Everything was falling into place.
[00:01:42] Jennifer Buta: He.
He played sports, had a beautiful girlfriend, worked a job.
He was ready to leave the nest.
[00:01:51] Bob: Ready to take on the world.
Jennifer and Jordan had a great mother, son, friendship.
He did not cause me any trouble.
We were very, very close in our relationship.
Some of my favorite memories with him is when we would travel for basketball.
Always laugh and be like, I can’t believe your mom knows these songs.
They’re definitely not, you know, the most appropriate sometimes.
Um, but I knew them all because of him and we shared that together.
Sometimes goofing off and dancing around in the kitchen.
That came from a very young age, we started doing that.
[00:03:04] Jennifer Buta: Absolutely.
He was really all about the rap and hip hop, so we listened to a lot of that.
[00:03:46] Jennifer Buta: Yeah, so on Jordan’s freshman year, he tore his ACL.
[00:03:50] Jennifer Buta: Oh God.
Unfortunately, the following years when we had Covid, so there wasn’t much in terms of.
It’s really frustrating that you don’t know what to do with yourself.
[00:04:27] Jennifer Buta: Absolutely.
[00:04:35] Bob: Yeah.
But we got through it.
I mean, I’m not gonna say there weren’t nights that we both cried about it.
[00:04:43] Bob: Mm mm-hmm.
It began simply enough with Jordan getting ready to go to the beach.
[00:05:11] John DeMay: It was a Thursday night.
We were getting ready to leave on vacation for two weeks.
And it was one of our, one of our favorite trips that we do every year.
So we were packed and ready to go, and he came strolling into the house.
I saw him for the last time at around 10, 10 15 that night.
And I had just told him goodnight.
I’m, I’m heading to bed and cut you in the morning.
And that’s what I did.
I went to sleep.
My wife was up finishing laundry, getting the, getting our other two kids bags packed.
Jordan was downstairs in his room getting his bags packed.
He was doing some laundry.
[00:06:01] Bob: doing laundry packing, saying goodbye to his girlfriend before trip.
And then Jordan gets a private message, a one-word message from someone he doesn’t know.
In fact, I’ll bet you’ve received one just like it, probably more than once.
The message says it’s from a woman named Dani Robertts.
It comes at 10:19 PM.
Jordan Who is you?
Dani I’m Dani from Texas, but in Georgia at the moment.
Hope I didn’t invade your privacy.
Jordan Nah, you good.
Jordan Lift, play sports and listen to music.
Well, I like hanging out with friends and playing sexy games.
Sorry, that came out wrong.
My bad,
Dani Sorry if I got upset.
Just bored, to be honest.
I thought you might want to do something fun.
It is actually a sneak pic exchange.
It’s just for fun though.
It’s actually a live mirror pic exchange showing your sexy body, no screenshots.
You get what I mean?
And it’s set up view once after viewing it disappears.
I can go first if you like, but you’re home, right?
Can you just take a mirror snap showing you’re ready when I’m.
Then I will go first with the sexy pic.
[00:08:02] Bob: The game goes on for another hour, two hours.
The pictures are innocent enough at first, Detective Larson says.
All you have to do is cooperate with me and I won’t expose you.
Jordan What I gotta do?
Dani Just pay me right now and I won’t expose you.
Deal or no deal?
Jordan I don’t have a grand.
And Dani agrees to accept that and not expose him.
So he sends $300 via Apple Pay.
Dani tells Jordan that she’s deleting everything,
[00:09:33] Bob: But Dani doesn’t.
And so they go back and forth and they start negotiating again.
And basically Dani is looking to obtain another $800 to delete the images off of Google.
[00:09:59] Bob: And the demands continue.
Jordan tries desperately to figure out what to do.
The person making these demands exerts maximum pressure.
Next message would be 14.
Next one 13, 12.
[00:10:32] Bob: Scared, and from his messages, feeling out of options.
And Jordan says, just, bro.
Later on at about 3:43 AM Jordan says, It’s over.
You win, bro.
And then he says, Because of you.
Do that fast or I will make you do it.
I swear to God.
So I went downstairs into his bedroom and I opened up the door and I found him.
He had shot himself in his bed.
[00:12:44] Bob: Detective Larson is already at work that morning when the 911 call comes in.
[00:12:50] Lowell Larson: Actually, I heard it live over the radio.
We heard the call go out and we looked at each other.
[00:13:39] Bob: Nobody could understand why.
The shock is overwhelming, even for an experienced detective.
A cursory glance at Jordan’s technology offers precious few hints.
She had communicated with Dani Robertts also.
Was not read till later that afternoon after she had learned that Jordan had died.
Tried to extort her also.
And I guess the unanswered question that we had of why?
was starting to unveil itself.
Typically we’re seeing him on Instagram and Snapchat, uh, right now.
And these perpetrators reach out to victims like my son, Jordan.
And they start off with mild innocent friend requests that turn into just generalized conversation.
And then eventually, uh, they, they entice the victim into sending a nude picture of themselves.
And that’s happening in a couple different ways for the men.
You know, will you send me, send me a picture of yourself.
And then they convince the, the, the victim to send a picture of themselves.
In our case, it was, um, so.
Uh, then the extortion starts.
They pursue them swiftly.
A lot of these perpetrators are, are educated on how to do it.
This is kind of their job.
[00:17:35] Bob: The investigation into Jordan’s death begins in earnest then.
[00:17:39] Lowell Larson: Right.
His death occurred Friday morning.
I had worked on obtaining the information from Meta.
Which is, this occurred over Instagram, so Meta controlled Facebook and Instagram.
[00:18:14] Bob: Those transcripts, chilling as they are to read.
Also provide essential clues for Detective Larson.
He vows to make someone responsible for what happened to Jordan.
So we knew we were dealing with Nigeria that Monday.
[00:18:54] Bob: This is both good news and bad news.
They have a hot lead, but in truth, they don’t know where it really leads to.
[00:19:23] Lowell Larson: Right.
They take a huge risk.
[00:19:58] Lowell Larson: The parents made this a public story, which is a huge step.
Shocked the whole world.
There are a few other breaks too.
That’s in charge of all of Michigan FBI agents.
He used to be the league at, or the legal attache in Nigeria.
So he had that personal connection already in place.
So that was tremendous.
And he actually flew to Nigeria to request extradition directly.
[00:22:18] Lowell Larson: Correct.
Not far from Jordan’s home.
[00:22:40] Bob: What was the room like?
[00:22:55] Lowell Larson: Very, yeah.
Very, very emotional.
Yes,
[00:22:59] Bob: Very emotional.
[00:23:03] Jennifer Buta: It was awful.
This is what I read it.
She too is really just an innocent bystander of sextortion.
[00:23:53] Bob: the two brothers are sentenced to 210 months in prison.
That’s, uh, it should have been longer.
And I guess I was just happy it occurred.
And that’s exactly what happened.
We, we did extradite ‘em and they were sentenced.
So I was just very happy that they were sentenced here in federal court.
[00:24:36] Bob: And Detective Larson doesn’t stop there.
A set of other people aided the crime too.
Many of them were also held accountable.
And that individual was also arrested in a sense, entered a plea.
The money mule converts the money into Bitcoin.
And that’s, and that something for someone to think about is in the middle of this.
[00:26:04] Bob: As you might imagine, Jordan’s dad has mixed feelings about the prosecution.
And, uh, I have a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice.
I’m a former police officer.
I have to, I have to trust the system because it does work.
So it’s a horrible thing.
These are all things that have to work together in unison to affect the change that needs to happen.
[00:27:54] Bob: So what change needs to happen?
Jordan’s death raises a whole wide set of complex issues.
There’s a lot of groups and, and individuals that are doing this at a very high volume.
It’s a numbers game.
Or it could be, Hey, I’m in Seattle ‘cause I have a Seattle area code.
[00:29:02] John DeMay: Right.
[00:29:03] Bob: Where should I go to dinner?
But, and, and behind that might be someone starting a sextortion scheme.
[00:29:08] John DeMay: That’s correct.
And you almost have to assume that at this point.
It’s probably not anything else.
[00:29:40] John DeMay: Oh, absolutely.
[00:30:00] John DeMay: Yeah, a hundred percent.
The, the video’s up for were up for years.
Uh, they taught you how to get hacked accounts and buy materials, everything.
And our group of suspects used that organization and were trained how to, to how to do it.
And I, I tell young people that it’s not your fault, right?
I mean, this is, this is a crime.
And these people are professionals.
They know exactly what to do and what to say and how to say it.
They know how you’re gonna act.
They know what you’re going to say.
These are all things that they’ve done time and time and time again.
So they’re very well read in, in what happens.
And, um, I make a run at stress that to them.
And, uh, that’s, I think that’s the biggest piece.
That’s the first thing John wants, but he wants more change.
He wants tech companies to do more.
I hope that it’s a deterrent for people.
And knowing that they can be brought here and face our justice system.
[00:33:06] Jennifer Buta: I mean, there’s several, it depends on, you know.
The day for me.
Because I told my kid about it and it happened to them and they knew what to do.
They remembered Jordan’s story.
And they came to me for help.
I also have parents that have reached out to me and said, this happened to my child.
I don’t know what to do.
I don’t know what to do.
I don’t know where to go with the law enforcement things.
Can you help me with this?
That sounds like a lot.
[00:34:29] Jennifer Buta: It is.
Sometimes it gets heavy and I can’t get to everyone.
Um, at one point it was just, it was too overwhelming to respond to everyone.
Jordan’s parents probably would never have learned the truth.
[00:34:55] Jennifer Buta: Absolutely.
Or maybe it was deleted from their social media like it was in Jordan’s case.
And check that they know that help is available.
double-check they know to reach out.
John takes such calls and messages all the time.
But just last week, last, it was last Thursday night.
We did three individual presentations on sextortion for each of those grades.
And that was about eight weeks ago, 10 weeks ago.
I did that right when, right before, uh, Christmas break.
I had the flu covid, something was happening.
And he was freaking out.
You know, every, every scenario is a little bit different.
This, I wanted to venture to get on the phone with this.
Young guy and he just wasn’t interested in talking.
He just wanted to message and that was totally fine.
I’m like, yep, we can totally, we can message, it’s totally fine.
Whatever you’re comfortable with.
And I just kept engaging with him.
It’s like a hostage negotiation.
You just want to keep them communicating, keep him talking.
He’s gone today.
And I, I don’t, I don’t get that.
And I, and I don’t want this to be you.
And, um, he needs to treat it that way.
And we went through everything.
The cops are here.
I told my dad and really, I really can’t thank you enough.
And, um, you know, and it just all worked out really good.
He has a lot of important things to share with parents and kids.
He often shows the dialogue we had him read earlier between Jordan and Dani.
It’s, uh, very chilling.
But the reality is it’s gonna happen.
And the message that we wanna send to people is, hey don’t do it.
But if it does occur, yo tell your family or friends and reach out for help.
Don’t you know.
Obviously don’t do what Jordan did, and you know, there’s programs that we can do.
There’s things that we can do to help minimize this.
In fact, there is a program run by.
So that’s a tremendous resource that’s out there.
We also tell everyone to, if this happens to them.
Is to stop communications with the person regardless of whatever threats that they do to.
[00:41:04] Bob: I can’t help but ask this question.
This story is incredibly hard to hear, honestly.
Uh, but you do this every day.
How do you handle working with this, these sort of horrible crimes?
So that’s where I find my strength.
[00:41:38] Bob: What does Detective Larson want people to learn from what happened to Jordan?
So just don’t think well.
You know this happened to a young male and I’m not a young male or, or whatever.
What we see in these scams is it’s an unsolicited contact, which we have here.
You know, so you just gotta slow down.
You gotta verify who you’re talking to.
I will communicate with the sheriff’s office and who should I ask for?
And so you, you know, independently determine what the correct phone number is, and you call.
And you attempt to verify that.
And it’s, as you know, you might be anyone or anything on the internet.
There was that trust.
And then the other cautionary tale I have is trust of the technology.
So if you know mm-hmm.
Like, like Snapchat, if, if it doesn’t allow you to screenshot it.
They’re not allowed to use this anymore.
I look at it a different way.
If they bring something forward to you, I think they need to be congratulated for having that maturity.
It’s so much easier said than done.
Jennifer has some wisdom about that.
You know, if that’s about alcohol or substances or driving.
So quickly that it’s hard to tell what it is to do.
There is nothing worth taking your life over.
There are so many people that want to help you.
If you find yourself in this situation, there is light at the other side.
Especially when, when you land teenagers.
But this conversation strikes me as particularly like really, really challenging.
Do you have any suggestions as to how to even get started?
It’s a real thing and your child isn’t an exception from it.
You know, Jordan was about to turn 18 years old.
So if it can happen to my son, it can happen to anyone.
And having those conversations, that is our greatest asset right now to prevent things from happening to kids.
[00:48:21] Bob: How does John keep going?
Keep agreeing to interviews like this one with us atThe Perfect Scamafter such a painful experience?
[00:48:31] John DeMay: I honest, the answer is, I don’t know.
I really, I really don’t.
And picture comes out, goes to law enforcement.
Law enforcement spends the weekend trying to, to get meta to release this transcript.
Transcript got released Sunday, I believe, Sunday night late.
I think we were notified either Sunday night or Monday about what actually happened to Jordan.
We had no idea at the time.
We have no idea.
There could be a dozen other kids that are getting sextorted as we speak right now.
We have no idea.
This is what happened.
And we wanted to let everybody know and hey be aware.
And we did that.
And the, the response from everybody was just overwhelming.
I mean, so supportive and, and thankful.
I think it’s the, it’s the fuel from the, the stories.
We gotta find these guys.
And we had no idea this existed.
[00:51:04] John DeMay: I think there’s a couple messages.
There’s, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of things to consider.
You’re certainly right there.
It’s, it’s, it’s a persona.
At the end of the day, they’re gonna use it.
And it’s to what level?
And not only to what level, but to what capacity are you able to process what’s happening?
[00:52:51] John DeMay: So my message is just encouragement.
But just go on that extra mile and, and.
Helping that, that out and hopefully that there’ll be some resolve there at some point.
If someone has a perception of that.
Law enforcement’s going to treat them badly, they’re less likely to come forward.
[00:53:37] John DeMay: Yeah.
[00:53:38] Bob: Part of the problem.
[00:53:39] John DeMay: Yeah, it, yeah, it sure is.
It’s getting way better, like I said, and law enforcement is doing an amazing job.
Then that’s the International Crimes Against Children.
It’s like a specialized group of detectives.
Most agencies with any size have an ICAC detective or two.
We have a, my department here in Marquette is probably 30 officers, maybe 40.
We have an ICAC detective.
They know how to handle it.
They know the resources to, to work on things.
It’s just not what they do.
He was always just happy and bouncing around and had a really open thought process.
And his, his friend group was very diverse.
He was the kind of guy that just got along with everybody.
And we didn’t realize it obviously at the time.
His purpose, I guess, was, was that times a million.
And that’s just so important.
And I wish he was here today to see what was happening.
Heroes end up being a victim of some sort and pushed all the way to the limits.
And heroes are, are never usually alive to see how much heroism they’ve created.
And, and I wish Jordan could, ‘cause he really is.
He’s doing some big things.
[00:55:53] Bob: What a beautiful tribute.
Sometimes I just sit back and I’m like, of course.
Of course this happened with you because you were this bright light and the center of attention.
Here you are in the afterlife still holding that.
It’s just that it’s no longer your voice.
[00:56:30] Jennifer Buta: Thank you.
(MUSIC SEGUE)
[00:56:37] Bob: ForThe Perfect Scam, I’m Bob Sullivan.
Call the AARP Fraud Watch internet Helpline at 877-908-3360.
Their trained fraud specialists can provide you with free support and guidance on what to do next.
That address again is: theperfectscampodcast@aarp.org.
Be sure to find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
For AARP’s The Perfect Scam, I’m Bob Sullivan.
