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A Sydney barman who took pictures from a series of women’s personal social media profiles and shared them on a pornographic website has been jailed for nine years.
Andrew Thomas Hayler, 38, posted pictures of close friends, colleagues and roommates and encouraged people to share fantasies about the victims, along with their own desires to sexually assault women.
Victims have revealed the disturbing and upsetting impact of being told their images had been shared in this way, with many fearing for their safety after learning of the sickening threats on the forum.
Hayler also superimposed the faces of his victims over sexually explicit images and posted them on the same site.
He pleaded guilty to 28 counts of using a carriage to threaten, harass and insult, telling the court his insult was “an outlet for a part of his psyche he didn’t want”.
Along with posting the images, Hayler also made comments such as “she’s a future rape victim”, “I’m getting this sl–“, “I already know where she lives” and “let’s adopt her as ours”.
The website had more than 300,000 followers.
The crime took place between 2020 and 2022 and involved 26 victims, only two of whom he did not know.
At an earlier hearing, Hayler said he published the women’s names because he felt it was empowering, but he also felt his offending was like “a tree falling in the forest”.
Judge Jane Culver on Friday rejected any notion that Hayler did not cause an immense degree of pain through his actions.
“The widespread humiliation of women could not have been overlooked by the offender,” she told the Downing Center District Court in Sydney during his sentencing.
“To publish articles of this nature is to unleash the potential for such widespread and ongoing harm to a very large part of our community.”
One victim said it was “unnerving to realize that so many people have seen me in these humiliating positions… It makes me sick” and fears for her safety since Hayler revealed her identity online.
Another said she was in a state of shock when she learned that Hayler had bragged about knowing her home address.
“The common theme is that they have lost a sense of security, privacy, memories once recorded in images with a happy context, and most of all, a sense of themselves and their past lives,” Culver said.
“It’s a deep harm.”
The court heard that Hayler had committed an offense leading up to his arrest in August 2022.
He immediately cooperated with police, providing passwords so they could search his devices.
Culver jailed Hayler for nine years, with a non-parole period of five and a half years.
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