'He destroyed my wedding memories' - Man who faked obscene images of bride jailed
ITV News reporter Rachel Hepworth talks to two of Orchard's victims and investigating officer PC Steve Cann from Hampshire Police.
"It was a total betrayal. I felt sorry for him, tried to include him, and this is how he treated me. It's disgusting."
Georgia Horton finds it hard to believe that a man she knew, and trusted, could violate her privacy in such a way.
She'd never been close to Ethan Orchard, but ten years ago she was at college in Hampshire with him.
He was a bit of a loner, so she reached out, they struck up a friendship, and had remained in touch, mostly on-line, ever since.
That was until she discovered he'd downloaded innocent images of her from social media, manipulated them using AI to make them pornographic, and asked other men to share their violent and sexual fantasies.
She was one of three women, all known to each other, who'd been targeted.
"He would make them choose between us, or say what they wanted do to us, " says Georgia,
"One of the posts was 'what would you do if you had five minutes alone with her?' And it got so much worse from there.
The worst one I probably had was, 'Would you save her? Would you rape her, or would you sell her?'
WATCH : The moment Orchard is confronted with the evidence in police interview.
Another of his victims, who wants to remain anonymous - we'll call her Sarah - can no longer look at her wedding photos, which Orchard digitally altered and shared on the illegal website.
"I don't know why he chose those photos," she says. "Using someone's most treasured day, taking something you can't replace and destroying it. It's just heartbreaking.
"It's affected my husband, my family. I can never look at them in the same way."
Through enquiries, Hampshire police were able to identify Orchard as the person responsible for uploading the images – The 30-year-old, of Highland Road in Southsea, was known to Sarah and even made her aware of the images being shared, but did not disclose to her that he was the person responsible.
In addition, Orchard encouraged others online to harass Sarah, disclosing her address and contact details.
"I was scared for myself and my family, " says Sarah. "I moved houses, I changed jobs. I didn't know who was looking at my photos. I didn't know who was seeing my information."
Orchard was arrested and later charged with three counts of sharing a photograph of a person in an intimate state for the purpose of sexual gratification, and one count of encouraging the commission of an either way offence and believing it will be committed.
He pleaded guilty to the offences on 11 May this year, and was jailed for three years and four months on Friday 10 July. He was also made subject to a 10 year Sexual Harm Prevention Order, and was given an indefinite restraining order.
"It's got real world consequences, and that's what I don't think people realise when they're doing this with AI" said investigating office PC Steve Cann. "It isn't just a bit of harmless fun- there are real world consequences."
The investigation also led to the discovery and closure of a website where his images were uploaded.
PC Cann contacted the FBI, aware that the site domain had been seized by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE).
It was being used to advertise indecent images of children and make contact with buyers who wanted to buy child abuse material.
The FDLE’s cyber team then set about seizing the website domain and removing the website, and were able to seize 1.1million indecent images of children.
Authorities were also able to identify more than 50 victims of child sex abuse spanning the United States, Canada, Australia and the UK.
Legal proceedings are now underway against a number of individuals worldwide.
PC Cann is delighted to have helped; "It's good knowing what's happened. Removing over a million images of children off the internet, and every single one of them is a victim.
"This all came about because one lady had the courage to come to the police and go, 'no, this isn't right.' "
The force wants to highlight that on-line abuse IS taken seriously and will be investigated.
"If you're doing it, just stop it. In the end, these photos will be there forever.
"If you get discovered doing that, that's your life destroyed. That's your victim's life is destroyed.
"It's just not worth it for the small sense of satisfaction you might get. "
Sarah and Georgia are moving on with their lives, but are urging others to be vigilant about the images they share on-line.
"It's so dangerous," says Georgia. "It's so easy nowadays for people, for predators to pick up a picture online.
"Most of my friends post pictures of their kids on social media. And it takes one photo to be put through AI and it's limitless, the damage that can be done."
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