SPRINGFIELD — An indictment in U.S. District Court sheds light on a global online network built on hacking, beatings, animal torture, sexual exploitation and even driving some to suicide.
Ryan Stenwick, 24, of West Springfield, was arrested Tuesday after being charged with four felony counts, including cyberstalking, stalking and use of fire in the commission of a federal crime. A federal judge is considering whether to keep him behind bars pending trial.
Despite being expelled from high school, not having a car or driver’s license, and living with his parents while working at a local Big Y supermarket, Stenwick managed to run campaigns of terror from behind his computer without ever leaving home , according to a prosecutor.
Court records say Stenwick was an established member of an online ecosystem called “Com,” based on financial crimes, SIM card swapping, swatting — the practice of making fake 911 calls to prompt a massive police response — acts of extreme violence, sale of children. pornography and encouraging victims to harm themselves.
“While SIM swapping and intrusions appear to be the main ways in which Com members monetize their criminal activity, Com members also protect and promote themselves through intimidation, terror and violence, such as the most traditional groups of organized crime,” says one motion. arrest by Assistant US Attorney Steven H. Breslow.
While Breslow pressed U.S. Magistrate Judge Katherine Robertson to keep Stenwick behind bars, defense attorney Kevin Murphy argued that his client should be released to his parents and deprived of any electronic devices.
“Unfortunately, he adopted a persona where he sits behind a computer screen and becomes a different person,” Murphy told Robertson. “Without access to an electronic device, this man is harmless.”
Robertson told lawyers in the case that he will likely have a decision on the pretrial detention issue next week.
Details of the case
A subgroup of the Com is called “764” and reflects many of the alleged exorbitant behaviors of the other network.
When federal agents seized Stenwick’s electronic devices, they discovered a 50-minute video of Stenwick and an unnamed associate urging a young woman identified as KM to get drunk, burn his initials into her thighs, and to smear oneself with one’s own blood.
“Good girl Now take the knife (exclamation) and we’ll tell you what to do. Rub the blood all over your (body),” Breslow quoted from a transcript of the video at a hearing Thursday afternoon.
“At the end of the video, KM was sobbing and bleeding profusely, and was later taken to hospital,” the prosecutor said.
Stenwick previously arranged for her and her family’s homes to be vandalized and encouraged her to attempt suicide, according to the documents.
Although he lives in western Massachusetts, Stenwick was indicted in Pennsylvania by a grand jury there, since that state is where these alleged crimes occurred in 2020.
The following year, investigators say, he paid one of his associates, Patrick McGovern-Allen, a New Jersey man, to bomb a minor’s house. McGovern-Allen traveled to the girl’s home, broke a window and threw a Molotov cocktail inside, setting the house on fire. The minor was not there but her mother and stepfather were sleeping inside, according to court records.
McGovern-Allen recorded the attack as proof that the job was done.
In 2022, Stenwick again instructed McGovern-Allen to fire eight rounds into a house where KM was staying. Bullets pierced the walls and windows and struck a wall, a piano leg, a table and a small stool, according to court records.
McGovern-Allen has pleaded guilty in the case, according to the prosecutor, but has never named Stenwick as a co-conspirator. Stenwick, however, made admissions to federal agents during a series of interviews.