Former holiday camp manager pretended to be girl to groom Kettering teenager online

A former children’s holiday camp manager pretended to be a 16-year-old girl to groom more than 70 boys online, including one from Kettering.

Cameron Osman, from Southampton, used the alias ‘Lizzielemon’ to identify his victims on Instagram, MyLol and Love Crush before moving them on to Google Hangouts, Discord and Skype.

His sick communications revolved around a fantasy online world with 44-year-old Osman pretending to be a teenage girl. He never identified himself, instead telling victims his camera was broken.

Osman would say that ‘Lizzielemon’ was from Bristol or Birmingham, that he had a fetish for dominating boys in school uniform and sports kit and for conducting teacher/student roleplay.

He was investigated by the National Crime Agency (NCA) and tracked down to a friend’s house in East Sussex in September 2021 when he was arrested.

Osman had resigned from his job at a holiday camp activity centre a few days earlier but officers found no evidence of him grooming children there.

His laptop and mobile phone were seized and Osman was found to have contacted 76 boys in the UK aged between 12 and 16. All have been safeguarded.

Investigators in the United States also uncovered chat logs showing sexual communication by Osman with underage boys in 27 countries. He searched online for underage boys in Colombia, where he was planning to visit.

Earlier this month at St Albans Crown Court he pleaded guilty to 36 charges including attempting to incite a child to engage in sexual activity, causing a child to engage in sexual activity and sexual communication with a child.

NCA operations manager Danielle Pownall said: “Cameron Osman callously preyed on vulnerable teenage boys, masquerading as a teenage girl for his own sexual gratification.

“I have no doubt, if we had not stopped Osman he would have gone on to commit more severe offending.

“We will continue to work with our partners across the world to combat the perpetrators of online child sexual abuse and hold people like Osman accountable for their crimes.”

Osman will be sentenced on June 30.