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Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Kris Jenner Steps Out in Paris Ahead of Kim Kardashian Robbery Trial
Originally appeared on E! Online and Corey Gamble are keeping up with Kim Kardashian. The Kardashians momager and her longtime partner were spotted out in Paris to support the SKIMS mogul as she prepares take the stand in the trial for the suspects of her 2016 Paris robbery. On May 12, the couple stepped out of their Parisian hotel in matching black outfits and sunglasses. Kris, 69, donned a long-sleeved dresses and leather gloves, while Corey, 44, had on a button-up shirt and a chained necklace. Kim, also 44, is scheduled to testify about events that occurred on Oct. 3, 2016, when she was robbed at gunpoint of over $10 million worth of jewelry—including a 20-carat diamond ring from then-husband Kanye West—at the Hôtel de Pourtalès in the French capital. According to investigators, five of the 10 defendants were at the scene of the robbery. Two of them have acknowledged their participation, while the other eight have denied involvement. (There were initially 12 defendants, but one person died and another is said to be too ill to stand trial.) More from E! Online Sean "Diddy" Combs' Daughters Jessie and D'Lila Combs Honor Late Mom Kim Porter Sean 'Diddy' Combs Trial: Defense Attorney Addresses Rapper's 'Love of Baby Oil' Morgan Wallen Breaks Silence on His Abrupt SNL Exit For Kim, the robbery was "the scariest thing" she's ever been through in her life. "Right as I was about to fall asleep, I heard guys running up the stairs," Kim recalled in an October 2019 episode of Felony Files. "They wanted my ring and my jewelry, so I didn't fight back. I just gave them everything and they tied me up." She continued, "That ten minutes really changed my whole life." In fact, Kim steered clear of visiting the City of Lights until June 2018. The armed robbery also led her to change her approach to security—refraining from broadcasting her location on social media—and become more reserved with her choice of accessories. "After I was robbed in Paris, I haven't bought jewelry," Kim shared in a 2023 episode of The Kardashians. "I was ready to give it up." However, when designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana gave her a diamond cross necklace in 2022 as a thank you for serving as a creator director one of their Dolce & Gabbana fashion shows, Kim said it "brought a piece of my glamour back to me." "This symbolized to me more than just getting a diamond cross necklace," she added. "That's why it's so special that I got it back from a really meaningful experience." Read on for more of what Kim has said about her Paris robbery. Kim Explains Why She Told Her Story for the First Time on Keeping Up With the KardashiansKim Reacts to Suspects' ArrestKim Came to Believe the Robbery Was Meant to BeThe Robbery Changed Kim's Approach to Security OvernightKim Returns to Paris for the First Time Since the RobberyKim Calls Robbery 'the Scariest Thing' That Ever Happened to HerKim Recalls Steeling Herself to Be Sexually AssaultedKim Couldn't Stop Thinking About Kourtney Finding Her BodyThe Shine Was Off the Diamonds for Years For the latest breaking news updates, click here to download the E! News App
Yahoo
06-02-2025
- Yahoo
Violent Online Group CVLT Coerced Kids to Self-Harm, DOJ Says
Last week, federal authorities in California's Central District unsealed an indictment filed Jan. 17 accusing three American men and one French man of participating in a 'neo-Nazi child exploitation enterprise' that 'groomed and then coerced minors to produce child sexual abuse material and images of self-harm.' The online network, which authorities claim promotes extremist ideology and coerces kids into hurting themselves — or worse — is shocking in its details, though experts say crimes of this nature are growing. Collin John Thomas Walker, 23, of New Jersey, Kaleb Christopher Merritt, 24, of Texas, Clint Jordan Lopaka Nahooikaika Borge, 41, of Hawaii, and Rohan Sandeep Rane, 28, of Antibes, France, allegedly victimized at least 16 minors around the world through an online group called CVLT. The indictment also referred to two unnamed minor co-conspirators, one of whom was also described as a victim. More from Rolling Stone Pop Smoke Murder Defendant Takes Plea Deal With 29 Years in Prison Sean Combs Accused of Assaulting, Drugging, Dousing Adult Male Entertainer in Baby Oil Killer Mike Sues Security Firm Over Grammy Arrest: 'Public Humiliation' Through CVLT, authorities claim, the defendants 'encouraged' children to record themselves participating in increasingly degrading and dangerous behavior, eventually 'escalating to killing themselves on livestream,' according to the indictment. (The U.S. Attorney's Office overseeing the case did not provide any further information on any specific alleged suicides and did not immediately respond on the record to Rolling Stone's request for clarification.) If convicted, they face 20 years to life in prison. Rane has been in French custody since 2022 on child exploitation charges, Merritt is already serving a prison sentence in Virginia for child rape, and the other two men appeared in court, where they were assigned attorneys before being remanded to U.S. Marshals. (Their lawyers did not respond to requests for comment.) The accusations are the latest in a series of federal prosecutions aimed at stopping people — sometimes minors themselves — from targeting kids through online harm groups. The networks of online communities, with names like 764 and CVLT, recruit and groom children on public platforms – including gaming sites – desensitizing them to extreme ideas and violence before coercing and extorting mainly girls into producing horrifying and illegal content: images of self-harm, animal abuse videos, and child sexual abuse material (often abbreviated CSAM). 'They're kind of like mimicking urban legends,' says a cyber-security expert who asked to remain anonymous to avoid death threats. 'They think to themselves, 'What's the worst possible thing that I can do?' And then they try to do it. It's like a challenge to them.' These types of harm groups are a relatively new phenomenon. CVLT originated around 2020 as a group that harmed children with overlap in the doxxing and hacking communities, while 764 launched as a Discord server a year later. Since then, 764 has become a catchall term referring to a community of overlapping harm groups operating on public platforms like Discord and Telegram, with some distinctive characteristics: Unlike financial sextortion enterprises, 764-style groups rarely seek money from their victims; perpetrators are often minors or users who aged into young adulthood while participating in ongoing abuse; and the type of harm they perpetrate, while often including CSAM, can also involve enticing and coercing victims into self-harm. The groups' reach extends internationally, and it's tough to assess the exact number of perpetrators and victims. The cyber-security expert says that in their work, they saw the number of abusers and victims grow 'exponentially' since 2020, from the low dozens to low hundreds. A 2024 investigation by Wired, with the Washington Post and European outlets Recorder and Der Spiegel, analyzed 3 million messages and found thousands of users across several countries. In their most recent data, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reported that in 2023, submissions to their tip line for reporting online child exploitation had increased by more than 20 percent since 2020. In September 2023, the FBI issued a PSA warning about 'violent online groups' coercing minors into harming themselves. 'These groups use threats, blackmail, and manipulation to control the victims into recording or live-streaming self-harm, sexually explicit acts, and/or suicide,' the warning read. In the California case, the defendants allegedly followed a pattern: They invited kids to servers run by CVLT on a platform the indictment refers to as 'Platform D.' There, they groomed kids, exploiting vulnerabilities like mental health struggles or a history of sexual abuse and promising to protect them from online predators. They'd then expose the children to extreme content like imagery of animals being tortured, women being raped, and 'gore' child pornography while promoting extreme ideologies like neo-Nazism and pedophilia. Gradually, the alleged perpetrators urged children to participate in increasingly degrading, extreme and dangerous behavior themselves, like calling themselves names — including telling a Black girl to call herself 'slave' and the N-word — punching themselves, and cutting and eating their own hair. This would escalate to engaging in sexual or violent acts, sometimes involving their pets, sometimes including the 'insertion of foreign objects like knives or cacti into their genitals.' Authorities say CVLT is a neo-Nazi group, but the cyber-security expert says it's also common for actors in these communities to use provocative imagery, including satanic symbols, simply for shock value. 'They're not using a picture of Satan because they love Satan or know anything about the religion or history,' they say, cautioning that this shouldn't become a distraction. 'They're only using a picture of Satan because reporters don't like it. They want to make the adults mad. And that choice is really all about their empowerment at the expense of others.' At its core, the threat of 764-style harm groups suggests a bigger societal problem, according to Professor and the Director of the Center for Cyber Crime studies at John Jay College of Criminal Justice Marie-Helen Maras. 'This points to a larger issue of the dehumanization of women, the promotion of women as subservient, not equal,' she says. 'That feeds into this narrative, because if you treat women and girls as possessions, as chattel, you do not respect their rights. They become another commodity that's distributed amongst groups that engage in performance crime for an audience.' 2023, the same year the FBI put out its PSA, also marked the start of a wave of high-profile criminal cases against these abusers. Bradley Cadenhead, the then-18-year-old founder of 764, was sentenced to 80 years in prison after pleading guilty in Texas to possession of child pornography. Last November, a Michigan man affiliated with 764 was sentenced to 30 years in prison after pleading guilty to child exploitation. Known as 'Rabid' online, Richard Anthony Reyna Densmore, 47, promoted livestreams of children engaging in self-mutilation — 'cutshows' — and sexually explicit activity on camera. Merrick Garland, then attorney general, commented at the time, 'No child should have to experience this heinous abuse. The Justice Department will ensure that criminals engaged in this depraved conduct are held accountable in a court of law.' In Tennessee, 25-year-old Kyle William Spitze, a 764 member who used the display name 'Criminal' on Telegram, is awaiting his May sentencing date after pleading guilty last December to charges related to child pornography and 'animal crushing' videos for mutilating chickens. He is facing 30 years to life in prison. Among the defendants recently indicted in California, Merritt is already serving a 45-year suspended sentence in Virginia. State court records show Merritt, a CVLT member at the time, pleaded guilty in 2023 to the rape of a minor under 13, abduction with the intent to defile, and production of child pornography, among other charges. The convictions stemmed from a 2021 incident where Merritt groomed a 12-year-old girl online before traveling from Texas to her home in Henry County, Virginia, camping out in the woods behind her house, having sex with her, and then enticing her to leave with him, prompting an Amber Alert before police found the child and arrested Merritt in North Carolina. The California indictment accuses Merritt of victimizing four more children. (A representative for the Henry County Commonwealth's Attorney's office said the victim there was not involved in the federal case.) Reached for comment on eight different federal cases related to 764-style harm groups, a representative for the FBI's National Press Office declined to comment on case specifics but offered a statement: 'The FBI's mission is to protect the American people and we take that especially seriously when it comes to the young and vulnerable. We will work closely with our law enforcement partners to investigate and hold accountable anyone who preys on children and coerces them to harm themselves.' Maras, the John Jay professor, says while criminal prosecutions can teach us about the methods these groups use to perpetrate violence, ending the threat requires a multifaceted response, including public awareness campaigns and technological tools to assist people who are targeted by these actors, along with seeking convictions. She hopes to see more efforts focused on helping victims, working to reduce shame around this kind of abuse, and denying the perpetrators the attention they seek. 'I think what we need to be focused on more is, how do we do things better?' she says. 'How can we better protect women and girls so they're not subjected to this type of technology-facilitated violence?' If you believe you or someone you know is a victim of exploitation, you can make a report on NCMEC's CyberTipline page or call their 24-Hour Call Center at 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678) NCMEC's free Take It Down service helps remove online nudes and sexually explicit photos of minors. Have images and videos you'd like to have taken down? Visit: If you believe you are the victim of an online harm group, the FBI recommends victims retain all information regarding the incident (usernames, email addresses, websites or names of platforms used for communication, photos, videos, etc.) and immediately report it to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center at Best of Rolling Stone Every Super Bowl Halftime Show, Ranked From Worst to Best The United States of Weed Gaming Levels Up
Yahoo
05-02-2025
- Yahoo
Pop Smoke Murder Defendant Takes Plea Deal With 29 Years in Prison
The only adult charged with the 2020 murder of rising rapper Pop Smoke accepted a plea deal from prosecutors Wednesday, capping a nearly five-year prosecution of predominantly juvenile defendants in the deadly home-invasion robbery that shocked the hip-hop industry. Corey Walker, accused of leading three juveniles to the rented Airbnb the morning of the shooting, pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and home invasion robbery with gun and gang enhancements and is due to be sentenced to 29 years in prison at a hearing set for Feb. 21, 2025. More from Rolling Stone Sean Combs Accused of Assaulting, Drugging, Dousing Adult Male Entertainer in Baby Oil Killer Mike Sues Security Firm Over Grammy Arrest: 'Public Humiliation' Neil Gaiman Sued by Former Nanny Who Accused Him of Rape Prosecutors dropped a murder charge under the deal. The new voluntary manslaughter charge, added Wednesday, included the aggravating factors that the crime was carried out with planning and a 'high degree of cruelty, viciousness and callousness.' Walker also pleaded guilty to the related robbery of a woman at the home. The manslaughter and additional robbery convictions carry additional two-year sentences that will run concurrently with the 29 years, prosecutors said. The pleas averted a jury trial that was scheduled to start this week in downtown Los Angeles. According to prosecutors, Walker and his cohorts planned the robbery to steal the cash, thick gold chain and diamond-studded watch that Pop Smoke, 20, had flashed on social media a day earlier. The group was able to locate the rental home because the Brooklyn rapper, born Bashar Barakah Jackson, posted a photo of a gift bag with the rental home address listed on a label. Walker appeared in court in an orange jail uniform, flanked by his defense lawyers Kellen Davis and Deion Benjamin. Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Hilary Williams asked if he had reviewed their 17-page agreement. 'Yes ma'am,' he said. Williams asked if Walker agreed that he provided a 9mm firearm to one of the juveniles. 'Yes,' he replied. She later asked if it was true he and his cohorts sold Jackson's stolen Rolex for just $2,000. 'Yes,' he replied softly as his grandmother and 4-year-old daughter watched from the gallery. At the end of the hearing, Jackson asked if he could interact briefly with his daughter. The child's mother was six-months pregnant at the time of his arrest, so he's never had a chance to hold his little girl, his family said. He was allowed to turn and blow her a kiss. Walker, 24, was originally charged with one count of murder, two counts of robbery and one count of burglary. He had been facing the possibility of life without parole if convicted as charged. When prosecutors first announced Walker's arrest in July 2020, they said he would be eligible for the death penalty because Pop Smoke was fatally shot during an alleged robbery. (Subsequent DA George Gascón later instituted a policy of not pursing the death penalty and recently elected DA Nathan Hochman has said the death penalty 'should only be used in the rarest of cases.') Three other defendants, including the 15-year-old shooter, were charged as juveniles. The teen triggerman admitted in May 2023 that he shot the celebrated 'Dior' rapper during a home invasion robbery around 4 a.m. on February 19, 2020. He was sentenced to 50 years to life in prison, but under California law, the maximum age for juvenile detention is 25 years old.) The eldest of the juveniles, who was 17 years old at the time, admitted to voluntary manslaughter and home invasion robbery at a hearing in April 2023. The third juvenile, 16 at the time, also settled his case and was sent to a post-conviction juvenile housing facility, a source confirmed to Rolling Stone. Walker was 19 at the time of the slaying and was described by prosecutors as a ringleader of the group. They said he 'facilitated the crimes by not only surveilling the crime scene before the crimes were committed but serving as the researcher, getaway driver, weapons provider and planner of this home invasion robbery.' Walker's prior defense lawyer, Christopher Darden, disagreed, arguing in court filings obtained by Rolling Stone that Walker 'did not plan this crime' and, in the 'worst case scenario,' was only the driver who remained outside seated in the driver's seat of the getaway car. According to police and prosecutors, the juvenile defendants, some in ski masks, made their way up to an outdoor balcony and burst into the upstairs bedroom of the Airbnb rental home where Jackson was taking a shower. Prosecutors alleged Walker was in communication with the juveniles via cell phone during the incident that ended with Jackson being pistol-whipped and shot three times in the back with a Beretta 9mm semiautomatic pistol. A police detective testified at a preliminary hearing that a Google account linked to Walker researched the rental home before the slaying and then searched 'Rolex oyster perpetual datejust' at 5:15 a.m., less than an hour after the first 911 call was made. In his failed motion to get Walker's murder charge dismissed, Darden argued that Walker 'did not share the actual killer's intent to kill.' In his October 2021 filing, he said Walker 'was aware that a weapon was being used,' but he was careful to insist that 'if it became necessary for the suspects to defend themselves, they should use a flower vase rather than shoot someone.' Darden said 'it was only after the robbers exited the house and reentered the vehicle that [Walker] learned of the shooting. In response, [Walker] assaulted the shooter.' As they left the hearing Wednesday, Davis and Benjamin said it's undisputed that their client remained in the car and didn't shoot anyone. But even if they won acquittal on the murder charge, he still could have faced life in prison on the robbery with the enhancements. 'Under the circumstances, we're confident this is the best outcome for Mr. Walker to still have a future. And of course, our thoughts and prayers are with Pop Smoke's family. This is something that never should have happened, something Mr. Walker never wanted to have happen,' defense attorney Davis told Rolling Stone after the hearing. Davis and Benjamin said they were confident they could have won an acquittal on the murder charge, but there was still the risk of a life sentence on the robbery charge considering the enhancements. 'Our goal was to allow our client to come out and be with his family again,' Benjamin said. 'The facts of the case showed he did not want the death to happen. And he's very remorseful.' Theida Salazar, the defense lawyer for the 15-year-old shooter, previously told Rolling Stone that his client was remorseful as well. 'He was born in custody to a mother incarcerated and grew up in a community that compelled him to identify and associate with gangs,' Salazar said. The lawyer called Jackson's murder a tragic ending for a young man and promising artist. 'Mr. Jackson was poised to make a global impact,' Salazar said. 'There's no way to gauge the heights he could have attained, and there's no replacing him or his contributions to the arts.' Best of Rolling Stone The 50 Greatest Eminem Songs All 274 of Taylor Swift's Songs, Ranked The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time
