CINCINNATI — A Warren County man could be released as early as Friday night after spending nearly eight years in jail for giving ultimatums to underage girls to be his online sex slaves or be killed.
Nicholas Edward Kurtz, who was 21 at the time, was living with his parents in Clearcreek Township when a tip from a 14-year-old girl in Wisconsin led law enforcement to him. Kurtz was arrested in September 2015, and he has been in the Butler County jail ever since.
U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Black sentenced him to time served as part of his binding plea deal with federal prosecutors. He pleaded guilty to cyberstalking, a crime that does not require him to register as a sex offender.
“Our heart goes out to you for what you have endured … I am enormously impressed with your continuing efforts toward recovery,” Black told the victim, who attended the videoconference sentencing hearing but did not speak.
“I’m really sorry for what went down,” Black said, assuring the victim that Kurtz would stay out of her life, or he would send him to prison.
Kurtz will be on supervised release for five years. Black ordered him to take periodic polygraph exams, undergo sex offender treatment and have no access to computers or the Internet.
He told Kurtz that his behavior was extraordinary and cruel, and never to be repeated again.
“You’re under strict supervision,” Black said. “It’s time to get on with life. I want you to succeed, the community wants you to succeed … so now it’s on your shoulders.”
The FBI began investigating Kurtz in November 2014 with officers from Wisconsin after a 14-year-old girl said Kurtz threatened to rape and kill her if she didn’t do as he demanded, including mutilating herself and acting as his slave, according to an FBI affidavit from September 2015.
The girl said she met Kurtz, who was using the name Chase Rein, on the social media site Ask.fm in October 2014 when she was 13. He pretended to be a 17-year-old who lived in a foster community, and they developed a friendship through the Kik messenger application, Skype, text and video messages, according to the affidavit.
“Kurtz then told (her) that she had to call him ‘master’ and follow his demands to mutilate herself and send him nude pictures. Kurtz sent (her) a list of 100 rules of a slave and videos of how slaves act, and he told her to memorize the rules,” according to the affidavit.
The victim eventually ended her communication with Kurtz in November 2014 after confiding in and seeking help from a friend and school counselor. But a few months later Kurtz contacted her on Instagram and told he would kill her and her family if she did not communicate with him again, according to the FBI affidavit.
In one message exchange she wrote, “you don’t know where i live you cant hurt me..or the other people.”
Kurtz responded, “Yes. I actually do … OK..I will be there in 2 weeks … I have to get guns first,” according to the affidavit.
The investigation led the FBI to other situations between Kurtz and girls between the ages of 12 and 16 in Virginia, Maryland, Michigan and New York, where he allegedly used threats and humiliation to coerce them into sending nude photos and sexually explicit videos online between 2013 and 2015.
“Talk to me. Or I will post your vid online,” Kurtz allegedly wrote to a 16-year-old girl in New York, in which he threatened to kill himself if she ignored him. “You are to message me right after your tutoring. If you don’t, I will take your parents with me,” according to the FBI affidavit.
After Kurtz was arrested, Clearcreek Township police told the media at the time that there may be dozens more victims, according to multiple reports.
Kurtz, who is now 29, said he will live with his parents in Lebanon, but spend the first three to four weeks after his release staying with his pastor so he can “reaffirm his faith with God,” and make sure he is moving in the right path.
Kurtz’s attorney, Jon Paul Rion, initially said that his client would not speak during the sentencing hearing, but the judge insisted.
“I have spent the last eight years in the Butler County Jail. I have definitely learned my lesson,” Kurtz said. “I am truly sorry for what I have done. I don’t know what else to say, your honor.”
Kurtz said he was good at working with his hands and thinking on his feet, so he didn’t think it would be hard for him to get a job. The judge ordered him to undergo vocational training until he finds a job.
A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s office declined to comment on the case.
At the sentencing hearing assistant U.S. Attorney Christy Muncy hinted that there were evidentiary issues with the case after a two-day motion to suppress a hearing in 2018 that Black presided over.
Kurtz's attorneys alleged that law enforcement made false statements or omitted material facts in an affidavit to get a judge to sign off on a search warrant for Kurtz’s parents’ home. They asked to throw out evidence, alleging there was no probable cause for the search, according to court filings.
“This is a case where we spent a great deal of time negotiating,” the plea deal with Kurtz’s attorneys, Muncy said at the sentencing hearing.
