MUM’S HORROR AS ONE OF ALMOST 2,000 VICTIMS My hell at the hands of UK’s worst web sex blackmailer
A YOUNG mum who was among nearly 2,000 people targeted by a web sex monster has vowed to help “every other woman” whose life he ruined, telling him: “You sicken me.”
Tayla Blake, 24, bravely waived her right to lifelong anonymity to reveal how she was horrifically violated by blackmailer Abdul Hasib Elahi.
Elahi, 26, was jailed last week for 32 years at Birmingham Crown Court after targeting women across the globe, including nearly 200 in the UK.
Jobless and penniless, he had prowled the internet posing as a wealthy benefactor – tricking women into sending him compromising pictures which he then used to force them into carrying out degrading acts on camera.
Beauty therapist Tayla told the Sunday Mirror how she had been desperate for cash after fleeing domestic violence and turned to a “sugar daddy” website as she struggled to feed her son.
Just two days after signing up, she was contacted by Elahi, who messaged as she put the boy to bed.
Elahi, formerly of Sparkhill, was posing as a London doctor called Joe Parker.
She says: “His photo showed a good-looking middle-aged man.
“He said he wanted a slave and master relationship with me and that he’d pay me £800. He never said it would be naked at the start.
“He said to have me as his slave he’d need a photo of my ID and for me to do a naked video stating I was ‘property’, giving my name and address.
“He piled on the pressure. I thought, I need the money…”
In the hours that followed, Elahi coerced Tayla into sending a string of degrading videos, promising her £800 which would pay off her debts.
She recalls: “I felt like I was being tortured, even though he wasn’t there with me. He had me naked, giving him my address within the space of an hour.
“All I wanted was to feed me and my son and get stability. He knew exactly what he was doing the whole time.”
Elahi paid her nothing – then sold the footage and her personal details to online contacts. It ended up being shared on multiple X-rated adults sites, free for anyone to see.
The court heard Elahi had made more than £25,000 selling content obtained by blackmail as sick “box sets”, including on encrypted app Telegram.
He was jailed after admitting 158 charges in separate hearings.
As well as making them abuse themselves in sickening ways, including selfmutilation, he blackmailed some women – not Tayla – into sending footage of themselves abusing young children, and made girls abuse siblings. His terrified victims felt they had no choice but to comply.
His 72 known victims ranged in age from eight months to adult.
Before being targeted, Tayla had been living in a safe house for domestic violence survivors, but had moved into social housing and was struggling with
All I wanted was to feed me and my son. He knew exactly what he was doing
TAYLA BLAKE EXPLAINS HOW SHE WAS DRAWN INTO ELAHI’S EVIL ENDEAVOURS
bills. She earned around £100 a week in a salon, but even with income support had to rely at times on food banks.
She says of Elahi’s approach: “To some people £800 won’t seem a lot – but for me at the time it did.
“We had nothing spare. As a parent you’ll do anything.”
When he made contact in April 2018, she had suffered a miscarriage at 19 weeks and “wasn’t thinking straight”. Tayla says: “The scale of his
crimes sickens me. He put my stuff out there and I didn’t know where, or who had seen it.
“I didn’t want to go out. I came off social media, locked myself away – I didn’t exist. The worst bit is that it’s still out there and there’s nothing I can do.” She told how a friend had suggested she sign up to Seeking Arrangements to help
It sickens me, I didn’t know who had seen it. I quit my job, I came off all social media TAYLA BLAKE TELLS HOW ELAHI’S CALLOUSNESS DESTROYED HER LIFE
with her rent and debts. Tayla explains: “They said you don’t have to sleep with the men, just send the odd picture. It sounded straightforward.”
Elahi messaged her at around 8pm one evening. She followed his initial instructions but he withheld payment.
Over the next 10 hours he demanded she send him a string of videos.
She recalls: “He sent me videos of other girls doing these things and said I had to do them as punishment.
“It was humiliating, but I thought only he would see them. I needed the money, I felt like I had to keep going.
“He kept me up until 8am. I kept saying I was tired and my son had nursery in the morning, but he told me if I stopped I would get nothing.”
Once his demands had ended and no money had appeared, the trauma of the violation began to sink in. Tayla reported Elahi to police – but says she
was told they could not trace him as he had used a “burner phone”.
Days later, she was devastated to learn from a friend that the images – and her details – were on a porn site.
She says: “There were at least 70 photos of me and loads of videos.
“I felt sick and ashamed. I asked for the footage to be removed, but it would get uploaded again later.
“People I knew started messaging me. My Instagram profile had been attached to the images.”
Someone told Tayla’s parents, who called straight away. She says: “I broke down and told them everything. They couldn’t have been more supportive.”
In the weeks that followed, she quit her job. She says: “I was embarrassed. I became depressed and my financial situation became worse.” Then in early
2019 she had a visit from the National Crime Agency. Elahi had been arrested in December 2018 for alleged blackmail of a 15-year-old in the US.
Officers seized his mobile phone and computers and had identified Tayla among his victims.
She says: “I was horrified. They asked if I’d testify against him. I said yes – this monster had seen literally everything of me and I didn’t have a clue who he was.”
Elahi had tried to contact 1,367 women in the US – and was found to have victims in 20 other countries including Australia, Canada and New Zealand. In an investigation crossing multiple foreign jurisdictions, he was charged and remanded in August 2020. He admitted 158 crimes which he carried out between
January 1, 2017 and August 7, 2020.
They include blackmail, disclosing private sexual films and photographs to cause distress, making and distributing indecent images of children, sexually assaulting a boy, encouraging the sexual assault of children, causing or inciting children to engage in sexual activity, fraud and possessing more than 65,000 indecent images of children, including of babies being raped. Judge Sarah Buckingham described him as the “very worst type of predatory offender ever identified thus far”.
Tony Cook, in charge of sex abuse cases at the NCA, said: “Elahi is a depraved sadist who got sexual gratification through power and control
over victims – who he often goaded to the point of wanting to kill themselves.
“He has wrecked lives and families. Investigators were horrified by what he’d done and stunned by the industrial scale of his offending.
“The effects on victims will continue throughout the rest of their lives.”
Tayla bravely faced Elahi in court to read a victim impact statement before he was sentenced.
She said: “In a way speaking to him helped me find closure – but I still felt he was thriving off our misery. He showed no remorse.”
She has now found solace with two of Elahi’s other victims, aged 22 and 23, who also spoke at his sentencing.
She says: “Things he made us do are so degrading we struggle to discuss it with anyone else. We’re finding other victims to make a big support group.”