Cases › produced harmful content › LR-2026-0739
Ohio man convicted under Take It Down Act for AI deepfakes and harassment
Preliminary Why: Publisher not yet named · subject to change
Developing: a major or severe case captured in the last 72 hours. Later changes are logged on the corrections page.
Status: action reported, no fix
No source states: loss or records, developer and model, agent tool, could do, deployer, industry.
Severity major: Test applied: major, a stated count of two or more affected parties. Fact: the sources state messages were sent to at least six victims.
The incident concerns James Strahler II, a Columbus, Ohio man who installed more than 24 AI platforms and more than 100 web-based AI models on his phone. Officials said he used phone calls, voicemails, text messages and online posts to harass victims, sending harassing messages to at least six adult women from December 2024 through June 2025. The messages included nude images of the victims, both real and AI-generated. Prosecutors said he also posted AI-generated obscene images of children online. His conduct was first reported to Hilliard police and the Delaware County Sheriff’s Office before being referred to the FBI, and he was arrested on federal charges in June 2025. He pleaded guilty to cyberstalking, producing obscene visual representations of child sexual abuse, and publication of digital forgeries, the last falling under the Take It Down Act. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
What happened
What was done
Risks
Also84 incidents
Rising: 6 vs 3.8 a week
Sorted by rule from the case's fields; not yet read from the sources.
Controls
Not yet read for controls. Controls that mitigate the primary risk:
ModelMarking machine-made output · Abuse monitoring and account enforcement · Content safety classifiers
ApplicationPeople told they are dealing with AI
Infrastructure / targetSimilar incidents
Evidence
- What set it off misused by a person
No source states: what the AI was doing, when it was found, how many records were exposed, the direct loss, any court case, the cause.
Show the full account: 5 items from the primary sources
What happened, in order
- December 2024 through June 2025 Harassing messages sent to at least six adult women.
- June 2025 Arrested on federal charges.
Not dated in the sources:
- Conduct first reported to local police and the sheriff's office, then referred to the FBI.
- Pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to cybercrimes; the source says this was earlier in the year of publication.
- Sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Show every field, with its source and grade
What happened
Impact
LR-2026-0739 · version 1 · published 2026-11-01 after automatic checks; not yet checked field by field by a person · JSON