Like he was holding a knife to my throat
A YOUNG woman ‘lured in’ and tormented by Falder said she had humiliated herself at his command because it felt as if he was holding a knife to her throat.
The victim, who was a schoolgirl at the time, lived in constant fear the Cambridge graduate would send compromising images to her friends and family – and was even blackmailed into eating dog food.
She was first approached by Falder on Gumtree after posting an advert as a babysitter to earn money while studying for her exams.
Falder posed as a depressed artist called Liz and duped the girl into sending nude images to be used as ‘tasteful’ illustrations. As soon as she sent photos, his manner changed from ‘nice’ to ‘threatening’.
Over two months, he blackmailed her into sending pictures of herself licking toilet seats, a loo brush and sanitary products.
Speaking anonymously yesterday, the victim, who did not see Falder in person until he appeared in the dock of Birmingham Crown Court for his crimes, said: ‘It was messages every day, so it felt like forever. Every day when I woke up, there would be a message. When I came home from school, there would be a message … When I wasn’t actually talking to him, I was worried about when the next message was going to come.’
At school she could not focus and was ‘scared’ to go out or risk meeting her tormentor. She said: ‘I didn’t tell anyone. I was ashamed … they [the pictures] were awful and I didn’t want any of my friends to think that I wanted to do that.’
The victim added: ‘But I felt like no one would understand because there was no one there holding a knife to me saying, “You will do this”, even though it felt like that.’
The ordeal led to the breakdown of her relationship with family and friends. She said: ‘I don’t talk to my family any more … It’s hard to have a family and a partner and friends when you don’t trust them.’
The woman said she would ‘always be scared of meeting new people’. She urged teenagers to be careful what they say to strangers online, adding ‘it’s a dangerous place to be’.