The Auckland man died in 2024, within hours of making contact with someone online who identified themselves as \u201cDonna Chase\u201d.<\/p>\n
He exchanged messages and images of a sexual nature with \u201cDonna\u201d, and she immediately began blackmailing him.<\/p>\n
Police do not believe Donna Chase existed, but that she was an AI-generated persona used to trick the man into sharing sexually explicit images.<\/p>\n
They told Coroner<\/a> Janet Anderson they believed the bank account the man paid money into was associated with an organised criminal network based overseas.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no doubt that the actions of \u2018Donna\u2019 were the primary relevant factor in [his] death,\u201d Coroner Anderson said.<\/p>\n \u201cShe deliberately solicited images of a sexual nature … and then used these to blackmail him. This is a practice known as \u2018sextortion\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n The man died \u201cwithin hours\u201d of his first communication with Donna, the coroner said.<\/p>\n In a published summary, Coroner Anderson said the man was under stress when he died.<\/p>\n A relative had died six months earlier, he was struggling with a relationship break-up, was on medical leave from work and had financial issues.<\/p>\n The man had told a relative he was finding it hard to get out of bed and had occasionally made references to being \u201cbetter off dead\u201d.<\/p>\n However, he had no significant history of mental health problems and no record of self-harm.<\/p>\n He had been due to return to work on the day he died.<\/p>\n That morning he sent \u201cfarewell messages\u201d to his family, who went to check on him and found him dead.<\/p>\n The man\u2019s wife later gained access to the Signal secure messaging account that had been installed on his phone.<\/p>\n She found images and messages shared with \u201cDonna Chase\u201d.<\/p>\n After the images were sent, \u201cDonna\u201d immediately threatened to send them to the man\u2019s contacts and demanded money, via bank account transfer and codes for pre-paid Steam gift cards.<\/p>\n The summary said the man handed money over, but did not specify how much.<\/p>\n The exchanges with Donna, which included voice calls, ended with a final message from the man at 10.09am on the day he died. <\/p>\n The coroner said it was reasonable to conclude the man was in a highly emotional and vulnerable state when he ended his life.<\/p>\n \u201cHis actions would have been impulsive and taken in direct response to the difficult and stressful situation he found himself in.\u201d<\/p>\n Man\u2019s suicide a second \u2018sextortion\u2019 case<\/p>\n The man\u2019s suicide was the second involving a sextortion attempt before the Coroners Court this year. <\/p>\n A teen who had dreams of becoming a policeman took his own life just hours after he was sexually extorted online in 2023.<\/p>\n The 18-year-old met a person on Facebook who called herself Laura Wilson<\/a>, who wanted to exchange intimate images.<\/p>\n He had no way of knowing he was talking to a scammer in West Africa who then threatened to share the teen\u2019s videos with all his contacts if he didn\u2019t pay $5000.<\/p>\n