Kidnapped Model: Suspect Arrested & Charged After Abducting Beauty To Sell On Dark Web

The authorities arrested Lukasz Herba as a suspect in the horrific kidnapping of a 20-year-old model. He was busted for allegedly attempting to sell the girl in to sexual slavery but the cops say he didn’t act alone!

Lukasz Herba, a 30-year-old Polish national who resides in the United Kingdom, was arrested on kidnapping charges on July 17, seven days after a 20-year-old model (who remains unnamed) arrived in Milan on what she thought was to be a photo shoot. The model was allegedly assaulted, drugged, handcuffed and stuffed inside of a travel bag, according to CNN. The authorities were able to track Lukasz down and bust him as he was escorting the kidnapped model to the British consulate in Milan. Authorities say that while they have Lukasz in custody, they’re still searching for at least one more person who could be connected to this horrific crime.

The model claims that Lukasz let her go because she was a mother to a small child, and he – allegedly part of the “Black Death” group – had rules against kidnapping mothers. “You are being released with a warning. You are certainly aware of your value on human slavery market. A mistake was made by capturing you,” he reportedly said in a document given to the model, according to the Daily Telegraph. “You have agreed to pay outstanding costs of your release of $50,000. We expect that money to be paid in Bitcoin within one month. Any sort of disobedience will result in your elimination. You have been treated fairly with respect and we expect to hear the same about us in return.”

The model says that after two men attacked her, she was loaded into a truck of car and taken to a cabin in the outskirts of Lemie, a remote town in the Italian apps. Lukasz allegedly planned to sell her to the highest bidder on the dark web, and he reportedly used encrypted accounts to demand the model’s agent pay a $300,000 ransom to stop the auction. The Italian authorities have since established that Lukasz allegedly organized several auctions of kidnapped girls, referring them as “prey.”

Supposedly, Lukasz was part of the “Black Death” hacker group, an organization allegedly operating in the “dark web,” according to The Sun. The group is reportedly heavily involved in kidnapping and human trafficking, though it’s unclear whether if this group is as dangerous as they claim to be. The group inhabits the dark web, a network of untraceable online activities and websites. These pages can’t be detected with search engines, and users need specific software to access them.

“Europol found traces of this group on the ‘dark web’ a couple of years ago,” Lorenzo Bucossi, the chief of the Milan branch of Italy’s state police, told the Daily Telegraph. “We don’t know if the accused [aka Lukasz] is linked to an organization or created his own version of Black Death.”

Our thoughts go out to the 20-year-old model as she deals with the trauma of this horrific experience.