A 21-year-old Goodyear man was sentenced to 21 years in prison after admitting he contacted three pre-teen children on Roblox, then coaxed them onto Discord where he coerced them into sending sexually explicit photos and videos. Richard Billingsley, born in September 2004, pleaded guilty to one count of sexual exploitation of a minor and two counts of attempted sexual exploitation of a minor, and he also received lifetime supervised probation as part of the sentence.
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office announced the sentence on August 31, 2026, and according to KTAR News 92.3 FM, the three victims lived in North Carolina, New Jersey and Texas. Sex crimes prosecutor William Heydenreich led the case, which grew out of an investigation the Goodyear Police Department opened in August 2025 after receiving a tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children flagging a user who had uploaded child sexual abuse material to Discord, per the county attorney's office.
How the Grooming Unfolded
Billingsley sexually exploited minors he targeted through online gaming platforms, initiating contact on Roblox before steering the pre-teens, who were 12 and 13 years old, into private conversations on Discord, according to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office. A search of his devices turned up more than 3,400 child sexual abuse files, KTAR News 92.3 FM reported. Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell described the tactics behind cases like this one, saying online predators are “master manipulators” and “relentless in their search of a victim to exploit.”
Mitchell also warned that the danger isn't confined to gaming apps. Grooming, she said, “can happen on any app where you can send messages” — a caution that lines up with data cited by Thorn showing that roughly 1 in 4 children ages 9 to 12 have been asked by a stranger to send nude photos, and that about 40 percent of minors have been approached online by someone trying to manipulate them.
A Statute Built for Cases Like This
The 21-year sentence stems from Arizona's severe sentencing framework for crimes against children. Under Arizona Revised Statutes § 13-3553 and § 13-705, sexual exploitation of a minor involving a victim under 15 is classified as a Dangerous Crime Against Children, which carries mandatory flat-time prison terms of 10 years per count with no eligibility for early release or probation, according to AZ Defenders. State law also mandates that prison terms for multiple counts be stacked consecutively rather than served concurrently, which explains how the case resulted in a sentence of that length.
To help parents spot warning signs, the Maricopa County Attorney's Office offers a free online toolkit called Cyber Predators, Real Risks, which includes red-flag checklists, videos, and expert guidance on how predators groom children through gaming platforms and social media.
Part of a Larger Surge in Reports
The tip that led to Billingsley's arrest is one small piece of a much larger national pattern. Roblox submitted 65,381 suspected child sexual exploitation reports to NCMEC's CyberTipline in 2025, more than double the 24,522 reports it submitted in 2024, according to the Marin & Murphy Law Firm. Nationwide, reports of online child enticement submitted to NCMEC's CyberTipline reached 1,413,347 in 2025, a 158 percent jump over 2024, per the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.
Some of that increase traces back to federal policy. The REPORT Act, enacted in 2024, imposes mandatory reporting obligations on electronic service providers for online enticement and child sex trafficking, with fines reaching up to $850,000 for a first offense and $1 million for later violations, according to the office of Sen. Marsha Blackburn. In 2025, eight major platforms — including Roblox and Discord — generated 81 percent of all CyberTipline reports, submitting more than 17 million reports of suspected exploitation combined, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee found.
Billingsley's case also mirrors the pattern at the center of a sprawling civil litigation effort. Dozens of federal child exploitation lawsuits against Roblox have been consolidated in California federal court under multidistrict litigation, with plaintiffs alleging predators routinely contact children inside Roblox before steering them to apps like Discord because the platform's safety features fail to stop that off-platform migration, per Marin & Murphy Law Firm. Hoodline has tracked that legal fight closely, alongside other recent cases involving grooming that started on Roblox.
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