EXCLUSIVE: Man accused of being in 'Discord grooming gang' from bedroom says 'it was more likely his convicted paedophile brother'

A teenager played a key role in an online crime group, that coerced girls into sending indecent images of themselves over Discord, from his bedroom, a court was told.

Richard Ehiemere, now 21, is alleged to have been part of a group known as CVLT, which targeted underage girls on the gaming messaging platform when he was just 17.

City Nightingale Court in London heard Ehiemere is alleged to have used a PC in his bedroom in Hackney and a Samsung mobile phone to carry out the illegal acts - but Ehiemere claims it was probably his older brother, a convicted paedophile, who was responsible for incriminating material found on his devices.

Ehiemere is charged with three counts of making indecent images of children and two counts of possession and supply of articles for use in fraud.

A trial that began on Monday heard that Ehiemere masked his activities through a number of Virtual Private Networks (VPN) and an encrypted hard drive on the computer.

Prosecuting, Jane Oldfield, told the court: 'In January 2021, the National Crime Agency (NCA) received a referral from the online forum Discord, a popular online forum made up of many channels, in which groups of people can have discussions and collaborate with one another on projects or topics of interest to them.'

She said Discord has a policy of monitoring channels for signs of illegal activity and reporting concerns to law enforcement.

She added: 'In this case they were concerned about a group calling themselves CVLT who were using their platform. CVLT can be described as an online criminal group or gang. Their activities appeared to include sharing indecent images of children, sharing

personal details for use in fraud and the practice of 'Doxxing' – the obtaining and revelation of personal material about people.'

The court heard the NCA tried to uncover the identities of CVLT members active on Discord, with one user called Retaliate#1337 logging on 383 times up to January 20 2021.

The user was seen to disclose private information about others, including email addresses and passwords which could be used to access online services.

Although VPNs were used, there were six occasions when Retaliate#1337 failed to do so, and the NCA was able to get the user's physical IP address, which the court heard was Ehiemere's home. Ehiemere was arrested on April 6 2021 when at home with his mother. He was asleep next to the Samsung phone that was playing a film.

It was seized and forensically examined and found to contain 29 indecent images of children, consisting of stills and video.

Ms Oldfield said forensic analysis of the phone showed that often the defendant was using it around the time they were downloaded and that he deliberately joined chat groups in which indecent images were sent.

The computer tower was also examined forensically and found to have a standard hard drive, a gaming one and an encrypted one that the NCA was unable to access.

On the standard hard drive desktop, was also found numerous 'combo lists', which are lists of emails and passwords that

allow access to online services for use in fraud.

Ms Oldfield said there was evidence that Retaliate#1337 had supplied other group members with some of the details and instructions on how to use them.

The court heard the phone had the Discord and telegram messaging app also installed, with the latter including more evidence of hacking, fraud and criminality.

Defending Ehiemere, Peter Corrigan, said Ehiemere's his older brother Barthimaus, who has a conviction for possessing indecent images of children, may have been responsible for the illegal activity, as he had lived at the same address until going to Hatfield University in September 2020 and had continued to visit.

The jury heard that Barthimaus Ehiemere was arrested at the same address in Blakeney Close, Clapton, (main image) July 2020 and police found hundreds of indecent images, of mainly boys, in his possession.

In February 2021, he pleaded guilty to three counts of indecent images of children at Wood Green Crown Court and was placed under a Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

Barthimaus had also passed the Samsung down to his younger sibling, so may have been responsible for the indecent images, he said.

Mr Corrigan also said it was possible Ehiemere's PC had been accessed remotely by unknown others, who installed the criminal material.

Giving evidence on Friday, Ehiemere insisted he only used Snapchat, WhatsApp and Instagram, plus standard SMS to message people.

He said he was unaware that Discord and Telegram were installed on his phone, and he had never used them, nor the encrypted hard drive.

The court heard he had suffered psychotic episodes and had two separate spells in mental health facilities for a total of about four months during the alleged offending.

He said he used VPNs due to "paranoia" at people spying on him through his computer as a result of psychiatric problems.

The trial continues.