Kronenwetter Boy’s Suicide Could Lead to Tougher Penalties for Sextortion Crimes

Friday, April 25th, 2025 -- 9:00 AM

(Natalie Eilbert, USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin) Luke Bird peeked his head into his stepson Bradyn Bohn's bedroom at about 10:30 p.m. March 4 to say goodnight.

According to Natalie Eilbert with USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin, he glimpsed a familiar scene: Bohn, 15, on the phone with his girlfriend. The two would FaceTime every night until they both fell asleep.

Gusts of wind from a winter storm could be heard, a promising sound for any teenager anticipating a Wednesday morning snow day announcement. Earlier that day, Brittney Bird, Bohn's mother, allowed her son to hang out at her hair salon while she bleached his friend's hair.

The boys eagerly plotted their snow-day plans, growing ever likelier with the worsening weather. "They were laughing, joking, no signs at all that anything was amiss," Bird said.

In less than 24 hours, she would find her son dead, a note stuck to her husband's computer that read, "Make sure he gets caught. I'm so sorry." He had taken his own life.

It didn't make sense to anybody who knew Bohn. He had no history of mental health concerns. He loved being part of his school baseball team, spending the last four summers traveling with his teammates for games.

As a wrestler, he would cry after winning matches, an intensity that captured the profound empathy he carried for others. And he loved his little sister, 9-year-old Aurora.

"We kept asking ourselves, 'Why?' and 'What happened?' He was fine. He wanted to go skiing," said Bird, 36. "We were going to go to concerts this summer. We had all this stuff planned. We were so confused."

Bird can't shake a conversation she had with Bohn in October, after one of her friend's sons died by suicide. They sat in his bedroom, broaching the uncomfortable subject.

She wanted Bohn to know he could always talk to her if he was struggling. At the time, the idea of suicide was unfathomable to Bohn, who reassured her, "Mom, I would never do that."

Bohn's death, although logic-defying, fits into a disturbing online trend that has been flagged by the FBI and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children for a number of years and is now the fastest-growing cybercrime targeting children in North America.

Sextortion is a form of child sexual exploitation that involves threatening or blackmailing children, often after tricking them into sending them nude or sexual images.

The scammers threaten to go public with their photos if they don't comply with their demands, which sometimes involve money, coercing them into sexual activities or sending additional sexual content.

These criminal scammers target all young people, but in 90% of financial sextortion cases, the victims targeted are teenage boys between 14 and 17, according to a June 2024 report from the nonprofit Thorn done in partnership with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

"For all the cases I've seen, these kids are athletic and successful and applying to colleges and in relationships," Bird said. "These people are targeting kids who have everything to lose."

The number of reports of online enticement, a category that includes sextortion, grew by more than 300% between 2021 and 2023. In 2023 alone, the CyberTipline operated by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received more than 186,800 reports.

By the end of 2024, it had received more than 540,000 reports, about a 190% jump, said Kathryn Rifenbark, director of the CyberTipline. Sextortion cases have led to at least 30 deaths by suicides, according to the tallies done by USA Today's in-depth reporting on the topic.

In the first three months of 2025, the Wisconsin Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force has already received 103 cybertips related to sextortion, Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul told the Journal Sentinel.

It's likely that, by the end of 2025, the number of reports will easily outpace the 237 cybertips the task force received in 2024.

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