Hull Crown Court heard they competed with each other to share the most “gruesome” and “distasteful” extreme videos
Members of a shocking WhatsApp group competed with each other to share the most “gruesome” and “distasteful” extreme videos that they could find – in an “infantile and immature” attempt to “gross each other out” and reach new levels of depravity. The existence of the group – nicknamed “We are all going to hell” – came to light when police found a particularly sexually graphic video on the mobile phone of one of the members of the group, a court heard.
Jeremy Andrews, 30, admitted possessing an image of extreme pornography on April 11, 2019. He originally denied the matter and was due to face a trial. A second charge was dropped by the prosecution.
Holly Thompson, prosecuting, told Hull Crown Court that police went to an ambulance station in Leeds to make inquiries about an unrelated matter. Andrews had been circulated as being wanted in connection with that matter.
He was arrested and his mobile phone was seized and searched. Eight videos were found but the prosecution was based on only one of the files, involving intimate human body parts.
The images were shared as part of a WhatsApp group that Andrews was in at the time, called “We are all going to hell”. Videos were added by members with the aim of shocking each other but they might have been automatically downloaded onto his phone, the court heard.
Nick Peacock, mitigating, said that the video dated back to 2018. “There have been no offences since then,” said Mr Peacock. Father-of-two Andrews had no previous convictions and he was working. There were references for him.
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Judge Alexander Menary said that the “We are all going to hell” WhatsApp group seemed to have been “infantile and immature” and involved a competition to see who could share the most shocking videos, including of extreme pornography. There were also images of people being “run over by a tank or shot to death”.
The motivation for the extreme pornography was not sexual but to “shock each other” by posting “gruesome and quite distressing” material of “mishaps happening to other people”. The videos were “distasteful” and were an attempt by the group’s enthusiasts to “gross each other out”.
Andrews, formerly of Mountain Ash Avenue, Scunthorpe and recently of Blackburn Road, Great Harwood, Blackburn, Lancashire, was given a six-month suspended prison sentence and 150 hours’ unpaid work. He was ordered to pay £800 costs.