Sick Messages Sent to Teen Girls by Youth Pastor Posing as 17-Year-Old Boy Revealed: FBI

Jacob Ryan Barnett of Catawba, Virginia was arrested this week by FBI agents for the attempted coercion and enticement of a minor, stemming from his alleged conversations with a 15-year-old girl in Michigan.

“The heinous crimes Barnett is charged with are what keep parents up at night,” Ann Busby, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Richmond Division said in a press release. “Educating our kids and communities about the threats posed by faceless, online personas is crucial to maintaining their safety.”

According to the probable cause affidavit from a special agent, via KFOX14, the FBI got involved after receiving a tip from the teen girl’s mother, saying the minor had “exchanged nude images and video” with a phone number she believed belonged to Barnett. Based on the evidence, the agent also believes Barnett “was exclusively operating” the TikTok accounts and phone used “while chatting with” the teen.

While speaking with investigators, the mother said she discovered that the conversations between her son and the man now identified as Barnett began on May 18, 2025. When she confronted her daughter about the communications, the mother said the teen told her the man first reached out to on TikTok, before they moved over to text messages, where he allegedly asked for nudes and sent “inappropriate” material to her as well.

The mom shared the photos the man sent the teen to the FBI, saying she “believed these photos were fake and not actually of the subject.” The person in the photos hasn’t been identified, though the suspect, in iMessage conversations allegedly seen by investigators, initially told the teen he was 17 after learning she was 15-years-old.

As their conversations continued, Barnett allegedly asked for bikini photos, “made sexually explicit comments,” asked for nudes and then “asked for something he could masturbate to” — with the teen reportedly sending him an explicit video.

When investigators spoke with the teen, she said the man first introduced himself as “Jodie Johnson” on TikTok, saying his “profile picture depicted a teenage boy.” She claimed he “insistently requested photos,” though she “didn’t feel comfortable sending those early on.” After he allegedly said “he preferred bikini pictures because the mystery was a turn on for him,” she said she sent those, before things between them got “very graphic.” She eventually sent photos of her breasts, she claimed, saying he responded with pictures he purported to be of him in boxers, before she sent a graphic video.

The girl’s mother then saw the communications between them while checking the teen’s phone while she was asleep, Googled the phone number and saw it come up as a match for a “grown man named Jacob Barnett.” The teen then deleted the video she allegedly sent.

Authorities then obtained records for Barnett’s phone, which allegedly showed that, in one instance, “within less than five minutes, Barnett messaged [the teen], talked to his wife for a minute, and messaged [the teen] again.” On another occasion, he allegedly messaged the teen while talking to his wife.

Per the complaint, one of the TikTok accounts authorities linked to Barnett “appeared to be following mostly young girls,” while records from another allegedly showed him telling another young girl “that it was time for her to see her first d–k.” According to the docs, she responded saying, “I don’t know if im readyyyy im only 15 and I barely know anything abt that whole topiccc” — before he “repeatedly asked for bikini photos and photos of her crotch … and encouraged her to masturbate.”

“I know through training and experience that people who use online chat applications to groom and sexually exploit minors often create and discard multiple accounts to hide their activity,” the special agent wrote in the docs, saying groomers “deliberately choose applications like Discord and Snapchat to groom minors because these applications are more private than other social media applications.”

The press release from the FBI said “phone records showed that Barnett was operating the number while talking to the Michigan victim,” adding that “agents observed that Barnett’s TikTok account appeared to be following thousands of minor girls. They also uncovered that Barnett was using Discord and Snapchat accounts to solicit sexually explicit material from other children while posing as a teenager.”

Per the FBI, Barnett will make his initial court appearance next week and, if convicted, faced a mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison and maximum punishment of life.

If you are experiencing or witness child abuse, call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org. If you believe a child is in immediate danger, call 911.