A former Pennsylvania teacher who posed as a teen girl on social media to solicit sexual images and videos from minors has officially been sentenced to 30 years in prison, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania announced.
Jeremy Schobel, 33, of Philadelphia, was sentenced by United States District Court Judge John F. Murphy to 30 years imprisonment and 20 years of supervised release after conducting an elaborate child exploitation catfishing scheme.
For more than three years, officials said Schobel - who was a former teacher at Harriton High School in Lower Merion Township and the High School of Creative and Performing Arts in Philadelphia - posed as different girls online, creating extensive, fake profiles to deceive young victims into sending him sexually explicit images and videos of themselves.
The investigation initially began on November 14, 2022, when the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) received a tip from the social media app Yubo that a user connected to two accounts was “grooming” minors online while pretending to be a 17-year-old girl.
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The user said they were looking for a “girl-to-girl relationship" and redirected the conversation to the social media app Snapchat, according to the criminal complaint. Investigators later determined the user was an adult male who they identified as Schobel.
Investigators said Schobel continued to pose as a girl on Snapchat as well and solicited nude photos and videos of an underage girl while repeatedly chatting with her on the app between Christmas Eve 2022 and March 29, 2023.
At the time, investigators learned that Schobel was an English teacher at Harriton High School.
On June 2, 2023, investigators obtained a federal search warrant for Schobel’s home. On June 7, members of the FBI Philadelphia Division’s Child Exploitation Task Force then executed the search warrant at the home and arrested Schobel.
While speaking with investigators, Schobel admitted to creating fake profiles on Yubo and Snapchat to pose as teen girls and solicit sexual photos from underage girls. Schobel said he had committed similar crimes for years and communicated with many teen girls between the ages of 16 and 18.
Investigators also said the search warrant issued for Schobel’s Snapchat accounts revealed hundreds of purported underage victims and thousands of pornographic images and videos distributed and received by Schobel.
Back in March, Schobel pleaded guilty to receipt of child pornography and five counts of manufacture of child pornography.
While Schobel denied targeting any of his students on Yubu and Snapchat, multiple students came forward following his arrest and accused him of connecting with them on the social media apps, investigators said. One student accused Schobel of sending her pornographic images of a teen girl he was impersonating, according to the criminal complaint.
“As a teacher, Jeremy Schobel was tasked with developing young minds,” said U.S. Attorney Romero. “As a predator, though, he chose to deceive and sexually exploit underage girls online — often from his school classroom. Today’s sentence closes the book on Schobel’s years of catfishing and gives his victims a measure of justice. Protecting children from abuse will always be a top priority for my office and our partners at the FBI.”
Schobel's conviction now requires him to register as a sex offender in Pennsylvania, according to officials.
Resources for victims of sexual assault are available through the National Sexual Violence Resources Center and the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline at 800-656-4673.
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