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A WOMAN allegedly posed as a teenage girl on Snapchat to lure in young boys – including having sex with one suspected victim.
Alyssa Ann Zinger, 23, pretended to be a homeschooled 14-year-old to prey on teenagers.
Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office
WFLAZinger, from Florida in the US, would allegedly engage in sex acts with the one of the schoolboys and would send others explicit videos.
She is alleged to have preyed upon at least five children aged as young as 12, reports Tampa Bay Times.
Footage shows her appearing stoney-faced in court as she was dragged before a judge.
Cops arrested Zinger on Thursday after multiple new victims alleged she had targeted them.
She was first detained in November for engaging in more than 30 sexual acts with one pupil.
Zinger posed as a home-schooled teenager to contact the victim on Snapchat.
The woman allegedly abused the boy multiple times – and sent explicit videos to multiple children on the platform.
Zinger was in a “relationship” with her first victim from May 2023 until September – when they “broke up”.
Police were alerted to her alleged grooming of the boy in October after he spoke up to a teacher at school.
The victim claimed in a police interview that he had engaged in sex acts with her some 30 times.
And he alleged Zinger bragged about molesting other boys between the ages of 13 and 15.
She has been charged with two counts of lewd and lascivious battery and five counts of lewd or lascivious molestation on a victim who is between 12 and 15 years old.
The age of consent in Florida is 18.
Zinger was also caught with the boy in July after she and the victim were accused of shoplifting.
She used her real name to the officer and gave her date of birth as 2009.
Police searched their system however and found she was born in 2001.
Zinger however claimed she had a half-sister of the same name.
Chief Lee Bercaw of the Tampa Police Department said, “It is disturbing and unsettling to see an adult take advantage of a child and prey on them.
“Anyone who may have been a victim of Zinger’s, we encourage you to come forward.
“The Tampa Police Department will support you and ensure a predator like Zinger doesn’t cause you or others additional harm.”
Tanya Arja, spokeswoman for Hillsborough County Schools, said the suspect never posed as a student at any of their campuses.
She said: “This did not happen at our school.
“However, we are glad that a student felt safe enough to come to an adult on campus alerting them about this individual.
“Our staff immediately contacted law enforcement so they could begin an investigation.”
What is online grooming?
SOCIAL media is used by billions of people around the world - including child abusers who use it to contact and groom youngsters online.
But kids aren’t only at risk online. Let’s take a closer look at the disturbing act of grooming.
Grooming is when someone builds an emotional connection with a child with a view to gaining their trust for sexual or trafficking purposes.
The groomer can be a stranger or someone they already know and the grooming can happen online or in person.
Often this is done by finding out information about a potential victim and trying to establish the likelihood that a child will report them.
They then try and isolate their victim and may use tactics like flattery and gifts to build a rapport or even threats and intimidation to gain control.
They can use chat rooms focusing on children’s interests or social media to make contact and often pretend to be younger than they are.
It can be hard to know if your child is being groomed online and obviously groomers will go to great lengths not to be identified.
The NSPCC list some of the things that should ring alarm bells include:
- Secretive behaviour about what they are doing online
- Having older boyfriends or girlfriends
- Going to unusual places to meet up with friends
- They suddenly have new things like clothes or phones which they can’t explain
- They have access to drugs and alcohol
- Inappropriate sexual behaviour for their age
- They may become more withdrawn, anxious, depressed or aggressive
- Alternatively they can become more clingy, have problems sleeping and eating or can wet the bed
English (US)