SC legislator whose son died in sextortion to join White House bill signing
When President Donald Trump signs the “Take it Down Act” aimed at tougher online revenge pornography laws Monday in the White House Rose Garden, South Carolina legislator Brandon Guffey of Rock Hill will stand there, too.
Not as a politician — but as a father whose grief has turned into a push for changes to Internet requirements after predators and schemers have targeted young people. Guffey’s teenage son, Gavin, took his own life in 2022 after being targeted in a social media sextortion scheme that the FBI says was a blackmail plot run out of Africa.
Since his oldest son’s death, Guffey has testified before Congress and held meetings around the state and country about the dangers of predators online. His fight —chronicled not just locally but nationwide in the media — has led to changes in South Carolina state law and now federal law.
“Whether I am in politics or not, this is my life’s mission,” Guffey told The Herald of fighting for tougher online restrictions and oversight.
Guffey was invited by Trump’s staff to be part of the bill-signing ceremony. He said he has been asked speak to the national press Monday after the bill is signed. Guffey has been featured on CNN, Fox News, and other outlets in the past three years.
“Any opportunity there is to get the message out is another chance to tell the people how important this is,” Guffey said.
The ceremony is scheduled for 3 p.m.
The new law had bipartisan support and included a push from First Lady Melania Trump.
The “Take it Down Act” makes it a federal crime to “knowingly publish” or threaten to publish intimate images without a person’s consent, and requires websites and social media to take such images down within 48 hours. The measure includes artificial intelligence images generally called “deepfakes.”
Some peers of Guffey in the S.C. General Assembly are expected to be at the ceremony Monday as well — including Rock Hill Republican Heath Sessions, along with state lawmakers Brandon Cox and Brian Lawson. Sessions said the three legislators have scheduled meetings with South Carolina’s federal delegation in Washington on drug pricing and other issues.
The group will be able to “support Guffey’s efforts as well” while in Washington Monday, Sessions told The Herald.
The federal law comes after South Carolina made sexual extortion a crime in 2023.
Guffey, a Republican representing District 48 and a former York County Council member, spearheaded South Carolina’s “Gavin’s Law” that took effect in 2023. That bill — approved unanimously by both Republicans and Democrats — made online sexual extortion a state crime.
The Guffey family case
In January, the FBI extradited arrested a Nigerian man, Hassanbunhussein Abolore Lawal, 24, who is accused of sexually extorting Gavin Guffey in June 2022 for money using explicit photos Gavin sent him.
Gavin was led to believe he was communicating online with a female in the United States but had actually been targeted by an overseas scam, according to court testimony and documents.
Gavin, 17, had just graduated from Rock Hill High School. He died at his family’s Rock Hill home after sending $25 to Lawal, but Lawal demanded more money and made threats to ruin his reputation, federal prosecutors said.
Then after Gavin Guffey died, Lawal continued to try to blackmail members of Guffey’s family, including his father, by sending the family explicit photos and attempting to extort them as well, court documents show.
Lawal was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of child exploitation resulting in death, distribution of child pornography, coercion and enticement of a minor to engage in sexual activity, cyberstalking resulting in death, and attempted extortion.
Lawal has pleaded not guilty and remains jailed pending trial.
Brandon Guffey filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit against Meta, the parent company of Instagram, after his son’s death. That suit remains pending in U.S. District Court in California, records show.
