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Russian Sex Offender Uses Photo of 'Harry Potter' Character to Seek Underage Victims

Still from the movie "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets."

A pedophile in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk using an image of “Harry Potter” character Dobby as his online profile picture blackmailed an underage girl into sending him explicit pictures of herself, Russian investigators said Tuesday.

The 25-year-old man approached the girl, aged 11, through Russian social networking site VKontakte, the regional branch of the Investigative Committee said in an online statement.

“After building up a relationship of trust, he sent her erotic photos and video files, and then blackmailed her into sending him nude photographs of herself,” the statement said.

Investigators said the man, who used an image of Dobby the house-elf as his profile picture, had had several online conversations with underage girls and have called on other victims to step forward.

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