Austin Jones (musician)

Last updated

Austin Jones
Born
Austin Henry Jones

(1992-12-12) December 12, 1992 (age 31)
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
OccupationMusician
Years active2007–2017
Criminal chargeReceipt of child pornography [1]
Criminal penalty10 years in federal prison
Criminal statusIncarcerated at Federal Correctional Institution, Loretto. Earliest possible release date December 31, 2027. [1]
YouTube information
Genre(s)Music (cover music, emo, pop punk)
Subscribers547,000+ before channel was terminated
Total views41.4 million+ before channel was terminated [2]
YouTube Silver Play Button 2.svg100,000 subscribers

Austin Henry Jones (born December 12, 1992) [3] is an American convicted sex offender and former musician, who was active as a YouTuber from 2007 to 2017, prior to his conviction for receipt of child pornography in 2019.

Contents

He accumulated around 540,000 subscribers and over 20 million video views up to his arrest. [4] [5] On February 6, 2019, all his social media accounts were permanently terminated. [6] [7] On May 3, 2019, Jones was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for receipt of child pornography. [8]

Career

Jones began releasing music in 2007 and started writing his own material in 2010. In 2014, he released an EP titled We'll Fall Together, which ended up at number 12 on the iTunes pop chart. In 2016, Jones released a full-length album titled Pitch Imperfect. [9] Jones also made videos of a cappella covers of songs by various alternative bands, such as My Chemical Romance's "Welcome to the Black Parade", Panic! at the Disco's "I Write Sins Not Tragedies", Fall Out Boy's "Sugar, We're Goin Down" and Twenty One Pilots' entire Blurryface album. [10] [11] [12]

Controversy and incarceration

A Change.org petition started by an anonymous 15-year-old girl to revoke his planned participation in the upcoming Vans Warped Tour surfacing in light of these events did not accumulate enough signatures, but Jones eventually withdrew from the tour and addressed the allegations in a video he uploaded to his channel, "Setting the Record Straight". He admitted that the allegations were correct and apologized for his actions, while denying that nudity was involved in any of the videos he recorded or any of the webcam conversations. [13] [14]

On June 9, 2017, a United States Magistrate Judge signed a search warrant for Jones's residence in Bloomingdale, Illinois. On June 12, 2017, Homeland Security Investigations executed that search warrant. On the same day, Jones was arrested at O'Hare International Airport by agents of U.S. Immigration and Customs Homeland Security Investigations on two counts of producing child pornography (once in 2016 and once in 2017). Jones consented to a search of his phone and signed a written consent form. HSI transported Jones to its offices to conduct a videotaped interview and Jones signed a written Miranda waiver. In each case he allegedly persuaded an underage female fan to make sexually explicit videos of herself, according to his directions. [15] At a June 15 court hearing, Jones was released from federal custody to house arrest in his mother's custody after posting a $100,000 bond, but was ordered to abstain from using the Internet while he awaited trial. [16] [17]

He pleaded guilty to a single count of "receipt of child pornography" on February 1, 2019, [18] [19] [20] [21] and was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison on May 3, 2019. [22] After a court hearing on May 6, 2019, Jones was given permission to remain under house arrest until he reported to prison on June 28, 2019. [23] On May 14, 2019, a YouTube video was released by YouTuber deefizzy citing evidence implicating Kevin Lyman (founder of Vans Warped Tour), Leslie West (owner of The Rave in Wisconsin) and Bryan Stars in covering up Jones's behavior and actions. [24] [25] [26] [27] As of 2024 he is imprisoned at FCI Loretto. His registry number is 52069-424. His earliest possible release date is listed as December 31, 2027. [28]

Discography

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jared Fogle</span> American former spokesman, sex offender (born 1977)

Jared Scott Fogle is an American former spokesman for Subway restaurants. Fogle appeared in Subway's advertising campaigns from 2000 to 2015 until an FBI investigation led to him being convicted of child sex tourism and possessing child pornography.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mel Reynolds</span> American politician from Illinois

Melvin Reynolds is an American politician from Illinois. A member of the Democratic Party, he served in the United States House of Representatives from 1993 to 1995. He resigned in October 1995 after a jury convicted him of sexual assault charges related to sex with an underage campaign worker.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kevin Alfred Strom</span> American criminal and neo-Nazi

Kevin Alfred Strom is an American white nationalist and neo-Nazi from Virginia who founded the National Vanguard. In 2008, Strom pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography.

Cobra Video is an American gay pornographic studio. The company has been the subject of scandals related to founder Bryan Kocis, who engaged in sex with a minor in one instance, and hired an underage actor to perform in another.

Bryan Charles Kocis, also known as Bryan Phillips, was a director of gay pornographic films and founder of Cobra Video, a gay porn film studio. Kocis was murdered at his Dallas Township, Pennsylvania, home on January 24, 2007; arson was used in an attempt to disguise the circumstances of his death. Two escorts, Harlow Cuadra and Joseph Kerekes, were charged and convicted for Kocis' murder and subsequently given a sentence of life imprisonment without any possibility of parole.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jerry Yester</span> American folk-rock musician and producer

Jerome Alan Yester is an American former folk rock musician, record producer, and arranger. He became the Lovin' Spoonful's guitarist after Zal Yanovsky left the band in 1967. Yester also has released two solo albums.

Jason "Jace" Alexander is an American former actor and television director. In 2015, Alexander was arrested for the downloading and file sharing of child pornography, and later pled guilty to one count of promoting a sexual performance by a child and one count of possessing an obscene sexual performance by a child.

Child erotica is non-pornographic material relating to children that is used by any individuals for sexual purposes. It is a broader term than child pornography, incorporating material that may cause sexual arousal such as nonsexual images, books or magazines on children or pedophilia, toys, diaries, or clothes. Law enforcement investigators have found that child erotica is often collected by pedophiles and child sexual abuse offenders. It may be collected as a form of compulsive behavior and as a substitute for illegal underage pornography and is often a form of evidence for criminal behavior.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mike Folmer</span> American politician (born 1956)

Michael Folmer is an American politician and convicted sex offender. He represented the 48th district in the Pennsylvania State Senate, which includes all of Lebanon County and portions of Dauphin and York Counties, from 2007 to 2019. He is a member of the Republican Party.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Keith Farnham</span> American politician

Keith Farnham was a Democratic former member of the Illinois House of Representatives who resigned from office and pleaded guilty of distributing child pornography in 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Josh Duggar</span> American TV personality and sex offender (born 1988)

Joshua James Duggar is an American convicted sex offender and former reality television personality. The eldest of Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar's nineteen children, Duggar and his family gained fame as the focus of the TLC series 19 Kids and Counting, spun off from a series of television specials. Duggar served as the executive director of FRC Action, a lobbying political action committee sponsored by the Family Research Council, from June 2013 to May 2015. He resigned from the position after he was reported to have molested multiple underage girls, including four of his siblings, when he was aged between 12 and 16.

Legal frameworks around fictional pornography depicting minors vary depending on country and nature of the material involved. Laws against production, distribution and consumption of child pornography generally separate images into three categories: real, pseudo, and virtual. Pseudo-photographic child pornography is produced by digitally manipulating non-sexual images of real minors to make pornographic material. Virtual child pornography depicts purely fictional characters. "Fictional pornography depicting minors", as covered in this article, includes these latter two categories, whose legalities vary by jurisdiction, and often differ with each other and with the legality of real child pornography.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mark Salling</span> American actor and musician (1982–2018)

Mark Wayne Salling was an American actor and musician known for his role as Noah "Puck" Puckerman on the television series Glee.

Michael Lombardo is an American former piano rock musician. He was known for writing piano-driven rock songs and posting them on YouTube under the username "MikeLombardoMusic", until his 2013 conviction on child pornography charges. He was previously signed to DFTBA Records through which he released one LP, Songs for a New Day, and one EP, The Alchemist. Lombardo posted music videos, song tutorials, and personal updates on his YouTube channel which had over 20,000 subscribers before its closure.

Hunter Edward Moore is an American convicted criminal from Sacramento, California. Rolling Stone called him "the most hated man on the Internet." In 2010, he created the revenge porn website Is Anyone Up? which allowed users to post sexually explicit photos of people online without their consent, often accompanied by personal information such as their names and addresses. He refused to take down pictures on request. Moore called himself "a professional life ruiner" and compared himself to Charles Manson. The website was up for 16 months, during which Moore stated several times he was protected by the same laws that protect Facebook. Moore also paid a hacker to break into email accounts of victims and steal private photos to post.

Playpen was a notorious darknet child pornography website that operated from August 2014 to March 2015. The website operated through the Tor network which allowed users to use the website anonymously. After running the website for 6 months, the website owner Steven W. Chase was captured by the FBI. After his capture, the FBI continued to run the website for another 13 days as part of Operation Pacifier.

GirlsDoPorn was an American pornographic website active from 2009 until 2020. In October and November 2019, six people involved were charged on counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud, and coercion. In December 2019, two more individuals were charged with obstruction of sex trafficking enforcement. The website was removed in January 2020 after 22 victims won the civil case against the company. According to the United States Department of Justice, the website and its sister website GirlsDoToys generated over $17 million in revenue. Videos were featured on GirlsDoPorn.com as well as pornography aggregate websites such as Pornhub, where the channel reached the top 20 most viewed, with approximately 680 million views.

Jeremiah Harris is an American convicted sex offender and former cheerleader who received national recognition after appearing in the 2020 Netflix docuseries Cheer. In September and December 2020, he was charged by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) with production of child pornography and other child-related sex crimes: "sexual exploitation of children, receiving child pornography, traveling with the attempt to engage in sexual conduct with a minor, enticement and other charges. On February 10, 2022, Harris pled guilty as charged to two of the seven indictments against him. On July 6, 2022, Harris was sentenced to 12 years in prison, and 8 years of court supervised probation to commence after his release from prison.

Jodi Nan Hildebrandt is an American convicted child abuser. On August 30, 2023, Hildebrandt and Ruby Franke were arrested in Washington County, Utah, and charged with six counts of aggravated child abuse of two of Franke's children under Utah law, four counts to which she pled guilty. She was sentenced to serve between four and thirty years in prison on February 20, 2024.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">R. Kelly sexual abuse cases</span> Cases surrounding child sexual abuse allegations against American R&B singer

American R&B singer R. Kelly has faced repeated accusations of sexual abuse for incidents dating from 1991 to 2018 and has been the subject of a long-term investigation by the Chicago Sun-Times since August 2000. He has been tried in multiple civil suits and criminal trials, starting in 1996 and culminating in a 2021 conviction for violations of the Mann Act and Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, and a 2022 conviction for production of child pornography. Defenders of Kelly maintained that he was merely a "playboy" and a "sex symbol." Judge Ann Donnelly, who presided over Kelly's 2021 trial, summarized Kelly's actions as having "[used] his fame and organization to lure young people into abusive sexual relationships—a racketeering enterprise that the government alleged spanned about 25 years."

References

  1. 1 2 Baer, Stephanie K. (3 May 2019). "YouTube Star Austin Jones Has Been Sentenced To 10 Years In Prison For Child Porn". BuzzFeed News . New York City: BuzzFeed . Retrieved 4 May 2019.
  2. ↑ "Austin Jones - Social blade".
  3. ↑ Pritzker, JB (30 January 2020). "Sex Offender Detail". Illinois State Police . Archived from the original on 26 April 2021. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  4. ↑ Seidel, Jon (13 June 2017). "YouTube star Austin Jones charged with child porn counts in Illinois". Chicago Sun-Times .
  5. ↑ "Suburban Musician Arrested on Child Pornography Charges for Allegedly Enticing Underage Girls to Produce Sexually Explicit Videos". U.S. Attorney's Office — Northern District of Illinois. Department of Justice. 13 June 2017. Retrieved 16 June 2017.
  6. ↑ "YouTube U-turn over child abuse singer". 8 February 2019. Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  7. ↑ Alexander, Julia (7 February 2019). "YouTube removes channel after creator pleads guilty to coercing young fans into sending sexual content". The Verge . New York City: Vox Media . Retrieved 8 February 2019.
  8. ↑ Holcombe, Madeline (4 May 2019). "YouTube star gets 10 years for persuading underage girls to send him sexually explicit videos". CNN . Atlanta, Georgia: Turner Broadcasting Systems. Archived from the original on 22 May 2019. Retrieved 1 July 2019.
  9. ↑ Castro, Danilo (13 June 2017). "Austin Jones Arrested: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know". Heavy.com . New York City: Heavy, Inc.
  10. ↑ Wilson-Taylor, James (14 March 2017). "WATCH: Twenty One Pilots Fan Records Acapella Version Of Every 'Blurryface' Track". PopBuzz .
  11. ↑ Selleck, Cole (October 2016). "WATCH: Dude Covers "Welcome To The Black Parade" With JUST His Voice". WRDA . Archived from the original on 6 October 2016. Retrieved 14 June 2017.
  12. ↑ Jones, Austin (1 June 2016). "YouTuber Austin Jones' cover of Bring Me The Horizon's 'Drown' is going viral". Alternative Press . Cleveland, Ohio: Alternative Press Magazine, Inc.
  13. ↑ Swenson, Kyle (4 February 2019). "Austin Jones had YouTube fame, 40 million page views, adoring fans and a shocking secret". San Francisco Chronicle . San Francisco, California. Archived from the original on 4 February 2019. Retrieved 5 February 2019.
  14. ↑ Crane, Matt (18 May 2015). "Warped Tour YouTuber Austin Jones responds to accusations, apologizes". Alternative Press . Cleveland, Ohio.
  15. ↑ Stutz, Colin (13 June 2017). "YouTube Star Austin Jones Arrested on 2 Counts of Child Pornography". Billboard . Los Angeles, California.
  16. ↑ "YouTube Star Austin Jones Released on Bail, Ordered to Stay Offline After Child Porn Charges". Associated Press . Los Angeles, California. 15 June 2017. Retrieved 16 June 2017– via Billboard.
  17. ↑ "Docket for United States v. Jones, 1:17-cr-00417 - CourtListener.com". CourtListener.
  18. ↑ Charles, Sam (1 February 2019). "YouTube star Austin Jones pleads guilty to child porn charge". Chicago Sun-Times . Chicago, Illinois.
  19. ↑ Pelisek, Christine (1 February 2019). "Former YouTube Star Pleads Guilty to Coercing Underage Female Fans to Send Sexually Explicit Videos". People . New York City.
  20. ↑ "YouTube performer Austin Jones pleads guilty to child porn charge". ABC7 Chicago. New York City: ABC. 2 February 2019. Archived from the original on 3 February 2019. Retrieved 3 February 2019.
  21. ↑ "Suburban Musician Pleads Guilty to Child Pornography Charge for Enticing Underage Girls to Produce Sexually Explicit Videos". www.justice.gov. 1 February 2019.
  22. ↑ Crepeau, Megan (3 May 2019). "Austin Jones, singer who hit it big on YouTube, given 10 years in prison for child pornography conviction". Chicago Tribune . Chicago, Illinois.
  23. ↑ Crepeau, Megan (6 May 2019). "Judge allows YouTube star Austin Jones to remain on house arrest until he reports to prison June 28". Chicago Tribune . Chicago, Illinois.
  24. ↑ Fizzy, Damon (14 May 2019). "The FULL Truth About Austin Jones Situation (Finally Exposing His Defenders)". YouTube.
  25. ↑ Lange, Ariane (14 May 2019). "Teen Girls Tried To Stop Austin Jones In 2015". BuzzFeed News . New York City.
  26. ↑ "YouTuber Austin Jones Pleads Guilty to Child Pornography, Facing Prison Time". AltPress. 14 May 2019.
  27. ↑ Morrison, Arianna (14 May 2019). "What We Can Learn From Damon Fizzy". The Odyssey Online.
  28. ↑ "Find an inmate". Federal Bureau of Prisons. Retrieved 15 January 2024.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.