Braintree, Essex: a bar worker was jailed for five years for making AI deepfake pornography of 20 women he knew, including a 16-year-old's prom photo, and posting it with their names and phone numbers on a forum glorifying rape
Between March 2023 and May 2024 Brandon Tyler, 26, a bar worker from Braintree, Essex, took images from the social-media pages of 20 women he knew, used AI to remove clothing or otherwise make them sexually explicit, and posted 173 times on an online forum that, in the prosecutor's words, championed 'rape culture and sexual violence to women', adding the women's names, social-media handles and phone numbers and, under one picture, asking 'which one deserves to be gang raped?'. One edit was made from a 16-year-old girl's prom-night photograph. He was caught after including his own Instagram handle in a screenshot. On 4 April 2025 at Chelmsford Crown Court, having admitted 18 counts of causing harassment without violence and 15 counts of sharing an intimate photo or film for sexual gratification, he was sentenced to five years' imprisonment; Judge Alexander Mills called his conduct 'the worst kind of toxic masculinity'. Two victims told the court of the impact: one said she still received anonymous sexual calls and that her long-term relationship had ended; another said she felt 'completely violated'.
- AI system
- Unidentified image tool
- Occurred
- 1 Mar 2023 to 1 May 2024
- Reported
- 4 April 2025
- Event location
- United Kingdom
- What the AI did
- Depicted or impersonated the person
- Reported harm
- Exploitation or AbusePsychological DistressReputational HarmRelationship Disruption
- Whose AI use
- Someone else’s AI use
- Setting
- Relationships · Privacy · Justice
- Evidence
- AI involvement supported · Causal attribution established · 1 source
- 2 claims: 2 reported. 3 open questions
- People reported harmed
- 20 people
AI system as recorded: AI image-editing / 'undressing' tools (not named in the inspected court reporting)
What Happened
According to BBC News' report of the sentencing hearing, Tyler trawled the social-media accounts of 20 women he knew and edited their images with AI, in one case removing a bikini from an Instagram photograph and in another editing a 16-year-old's prom photograph; some images showed the women 'completely naked'. Between March 2023 and May 2024 he made 173 posts under an alias on a forum that the prosecutor, Emily Farrelly, described as championing rape culture and sexual violence towards women; other users added sexualised comments. He posted victims' names, social-media handles and phone numbers alongside the images, which the prosecution said was intended 'to maximise distress and humiliation'. He was identified when a screenshot he posted of one woman's account included his own Instagram handle. Two victims gave evidence of the impact, including continuing anonymous sexual phone calls and the end of a long-term relationship. In mitigation his counsel said he had struggled with pornography addiction from a young age and had no previous offending. The judge said he lived in 'a dark world of fantasy' and had 'clearly intended to degrade and humiliate' the women.
Reported harm
Twenty women, one of them 16 in the photograph used, were depicted in AI-made sexual images posted with their contact details on a forum glorifying sexual violence; victims described continuing harassment, humiliation and, in one case, the end of a relationship. The perpetrator was jailed for five years.
Outcome
ResolvedGuilty pleas to 18 counts of causing harassment without violence and 15 counts of sharing an intimate photograph or film for sexual gratification. 4 April 2025: sentenced at Chelmsford Crown Court to five years' imprisonment (Judge Alexander Mills). The BBC notes that sharing sexually explicit deepfakes became an offence in England and Wales in April 2023 under an Online Safety Act amendment, and that creating them was to be criminalised through the Crime and Policing Bill then at committee stage.
What remains unknown
- The AI tools and the forum are not named in the inspected reporting.
- Whether the 16-year-old's image was charged as an indecent image of a child is not stated (the charges reported are harassment and intimate-image sharing).
- Any appeal or licence conditions are not reported.
What the evidence supports
AI involvement: supported. The court heard, and the defendant admitted through his pleas, that he used AI to edit the women's images into sexual content; the BBC reports the prosecutor's account of AI removal of clothing. The tools depicted the affected women; they did not interact with them.
2 claims: 2 reported. What the statuses mean
Reported Between March 2023 and May 2024 Tyler used AI to make sexually explicit images of 20 women he knew from their social-media photos, including a 16-year-old's prom photo, and posted them 173 times with their names, handles and phone numbers on a forum glorifying rape culture; on 4 April 2025 he was jailed for five years after admitting 18 harassment counts and 15 counts of sharing intimate images.
Causal attribution. Court proceedings reported by the BBC; guilty pleas.
- bbc.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
'used artificial intelligence (AI) to create deepfake pornography of women he knew has been jailed for five years'; '20 women were targeted in 173 online posts by Tyler, of Railway Street, between March 2023 and May 2024'; 'Another explicit edit was made on a photograph of a 16-year-old girl on her prom night'; 'posted his victims' names and social media handles online, as well as their phone numbers'; 'He admitted 18 counts of causing harassment without violence and 15 counts of sharing an intimate photo or film'.
Reported Victims described continuing anonymous sexual phone calls, the end of a long-term relationship, and feeling 'completely violated'; the judge said Tyler intended to degrade and humiliate them.
Causal attribution. Victim impact evidence and sentencing remarks reported by the BBC.
- bbc.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
'One said she continued to receive "anonymous sexual comments" from people calling her phone, claiming it led to her long-term relationship ending. "I have and still do feel completely violated by what Brandon did to me"'; 'clearly intended to degrade and humiliate'.
Sources
1 source inspected. Sources that repeat one account do not corroborate each other.
- BBC News Essex, 4 April 2025: man jailed for five years for AI deepfake pornography of 20 women he knew (Chelmsford Crown Court sentencing report)(opens in new tab)
s1 · bbc.com · News report · English · Inspected · 4 April 2025 · Primary
How the sources were read, and where the events happened
Read in English on 2026-09-18 (BBC News Essex, Lewis Adams, from Chelmsford Crown Court, 4 April 2025). Court reporting with prosecutor, judge and victim quotations. Applies to s1.
Event countries: United Kingdom. Affected-person countries: United Kingdom. Court countries: United Kingdom.
Perpetrator from Braintree, Essex; victims were women he knew personally (BBC); sentenced at Chelmsford Crown Court, England (UK, recorded as GB).
Reviewed for publication 2026-09-18: Restored under the 2026-09-15 charter as a harmful-artifact case with identified (unnamed) depicted victims, a criminal conviction and victim-impact evidence. One court-reporting chain read; claims recorded as reported. Original ID and first-publication timestamp preserved.
People described
20 women known personally to the perpetrator, including a girl who was 16 in the photograph used; none is named in the inspected reporting
People reported harmed in this case
20 people
0 AI participants · 20 other people harmed
The court heard that 20 women were targeted in 173 posts (BBC). Exact count of 20 from the prosecution's case; the 16-year-old is one of the 20.
Counted once within this case. The same person may appear in other cases. This count does not establish AI causation.
Tags
Cite this case
Compiled per our published methodology: verification statuses, sourcing standards, and corrections process.
APA
NOPE. (2026). Braintree, Essex: a bar worker was jailed for five years for making AI deepfake pornography of 20 women he knew, including a 16-year-old's prom photo, and posting it with their names and phone numbers on a forum glorifying rape. AI incidents. https://nope.net/incidents/2025-tyler-deepfake-conviction-uk
BibTeX
@misc{2025_tyler_deepfake_conviction_uk,
title = {Braintree, Essex: a bar worker was jailed for five years for making AI deepfake pornography of 20 women he knew, including a 16-year-old's prom photo, and posting it with their names and phone numbers on a forum glorifying rape},
author = {NOPE},
year = {2026},
howpublished = {AI incidents},
url = {https://nope.net/incidents/2025-tyler-deepfake-conviction-uk}
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