Toronto man sentenced to 33 years in prison in U.S. for ‘prolific sextortion scheme’ that targeted 145 children

Ramanan Pathmanathan, 36, faces more than 90 charges. (Supplied)

Warning: Graphic content

A Toronto man has been sentenced in the United States to more than 30 years in prison after pleading guilty to online sexual exploitation offences against more than 100 children over the span of eight years.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia announced the sentence handed to 40-year-old Ramanan Pathmanathan, who they said was behind a “prolific sextortion scheme.”

He has also been ordered to serve 10 years of supervised release and register as a sex offender.

U.S. officials confirm that the sentence will run consecutively to the 12-year term that Pathmanathan is serving in Canada.

In 2021, Toronto police arrested Pathmanathan and charged him with 93 sexual offences. He pleaded guilty a year later.

U.S. officials then arrested him in December 2025, and a month later, he entered a guilty plea to one count of child pornography and one count of coercion and enticement of a minor.

“This defendant spent years methodically hunting children online. He targeted more than 145 victims, some as young as six, and subjected them to horrors no child should ever experience,” U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said in a news release.

Between March 2014 and March 2021, Pathamanathan used multiple social media accounts to connect with at least 145 young girls and boys, according to court documents.

Posing as a teenage boy from New Jersey, he demanded that the victims engage in sexually explicit conduct during video chats with him, the court documents state.

“He directed them to expose their genitals, and to engage in sexual acts with dogs, siblings, and other relatives. In almost all the video chats with his minor victims, Pathmanathan sent the children images of adults engaged in sexual acts to show them how to do what he was requesting,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

Pathamanathan recorded his victims and saved the files on his desktop computer.

“When the minor victims would decline to continue to engage in sexually explicit conduct or blocked Pathmanathan’s social media accounts, he threatened to send images to the children’s friends or family,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.