Bilal Kazi

Introduction

Bilal Kazi, 27, a student from India who was studying at the University of Chester, has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for grooming at least 70 girls aged between 10 and 17 and manipulating them into sending sexually explicit videos and images of themselves . Kazi targeted his victims using apps including Snapchat, Wink and Roblox between August 2021 and August 2025, posing as a 14-year-old white British teenage boy and making his victims believe they were in a relationship with him . He was jailed at Chester Crown Court after pleading guilty to 37 charges including making indecent images, blackmail and inciting a child to engage in sexual activity .

Background Information

Kazi used the fake name “Reece” and a false photograph taken from a teenage boy’s social media page to aid his deception, then demanded his victims send progressively more intimate content . The investigation began after a victim came forward to Derbyshire Police in December 2021 — she had started speaking to Kazi on Snapchat when she was 13, believing him to be the same age — and passed to Cheshire Constabulary in May 2022, which said 180 possible victims had been identified in the initial investigation . Kazi had left Chester and the university, but was arrested at Heathrow Airport on 21 July 2023 as he re-entered the country .

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Convicted by plea: admitted 37 of 39 charges after grooming at least 70 girls online; 30 years with a 20-year minimum term.

If victims were reluctant to send images, Kazi told them it was “what people do when they love each other”; if they refused, he threatened to “leak” the images he had already been sent, or had recorded covertly on Snapchat, to their friends and family . In some cases he hacked into victims’ social media accounts, shared the content with their friends and published the pictures on social media . In one exchange a victim said she felt “uncomfortable” sharing explicit photographs of herself and wrote “I don’t want to do it again”; Kazi replied “That’s fine w me” before revealing he had a secret “back up” of images she had already sent . In another exchange, posing as “Reece,” he asked a victim for photographs in her underwear, then asked her to share her live location on the app, telling her he was “very over protective” . He was charged with 39 offences and pleaded guilty in July 2026 to 37 of them, with two left to lie on file .

Public Reaction and Consequences

Judge Stephen Everett told Kazi he was “a sexual predator” who took advantage of “what appears to be a lack of proper security on social media sites,” said “we will never know how many victims there were,” and told him: “You are a very dangerous person… In a sophisticated way, you got into the minds of young people and got them to do things that were totally alien to them” . The court heard some victims had attempted suicide, struggled with anxiety and developed eating disorders; one victim said Kazi had “taken away a sense of privacy and security,” and another, who was 13 when he first contacted her, said he took her “innocence away” . Detective Constable Georgia Hughes of Cheshire Police said Kazi had not shown any remorse and that many victims “lived in constant fear of what he would do if they failed to comply with his demands” .

Current Status

Kazi must serve a minimum of 20 years in prison before being eligible for parole, will be on licence for eight years once eligible, and will be on the sex offenders register for life . West Midlands Police have also charged him with a further eight offences committed while he was on police bail for the Cheshire investigation; Cheshire Police said those offences were considered as part of his overall sentence . Cheshire Police released Snapchat messages between Kazi and his victims following the sentencing .

Impact on Their Career/Life

A university student’s online double life ended in a 30-year sentence, with the judge telling him the victims’ lives were “blighted” — “These are not just pictures on a computer these are young lives that have been blighted” — and his case now cited by police in warnings to parents about the apps children use .

Sources

• “Man jailed for grooming 70 girls on Snapchat, Wink and Roblox” — BBC News, November 2026: source