A Sydney bartender who took photographs of a series of women’s private social media accounts and shared them on a pornography website has been sentenced to nine years in prison.
Andrew Thomas Hayler, 38, posted photographs of close friends, colleagues and housemates and encouraged people to share fantasies about the victims along with their own desires to sexually assault women.
Victims revealed the disconcerting and disturbing 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 his victims’ faces onto sexually explicit images and posted them on the same site.
He pleaded guilty to 28 charges of using a carriage service to threaten, harass and offend, and told the court his offense was an “outlet for a part of his psyche he didn’t want”.
In addition to posting the images, Hayler also made comments such as “she’s a future rape victim,” “I’m getting close to this whore,” “now I know where she lives,” and “let’s claim her as ours.”
Andrew Thomas Hayler, 38, posted photographs of close friends, colleagues and housemates and encouraged people to share fantasies about the victims along with their own desires to sexually assault women.
The website had more than 300,000 followers.
The crime occurred between 2020 and 2022 and had 26 victims, only two of whom I did not know.
During an earlier hearing, Hayler said he posted the women’s names because he found it empowering, but he also thought their offense resembled “a tree falling in the forest.”
Judge Jane Culver on Friday dismissed any notion that Hayler had not caused great harm by his actions.
“The widespread degradation of women could not have gone unnoticed by the offender,” he told Sydney’s Downing Center District Court during his sentencing.
“To publish articles of that nature is to unleash the potential for such widespread and ongoing harm to a large portion of our community.”
One victim said it was “disconcerting to realize that so many people were seeing me in these humiliating positions… I feel sick” and feared for her safety as Hayler had revealed her identity online.
Another said she was shocked when she found out Hayler had bragged about knowing her home address.
“The common theme is that they have lost a sense of security, privacy, memories that were once recorded in images with happy contexts and, above all, a sense of themselves and their former lives,” Judge Culver said.
“That’s deep damage.”
The court heard Hayler was offending until his arrest in August 2022.
He immediately cooperated with police, providing them with passwords so they could register his devices.
Judge Culver jailed Hayler for nine years, with a non-parole period of five and a half years.
