San Ramon man indicted for alleged online sex crimes involving at least 9 children

By Tim Fang

A federal grand jury has indicted a San Francisco Bay Area man for allegedly enticing children to engage in sexual activity online after he was convicted of possessing child sexual abuse material.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office Northern District of California announced Monday that 28-year-old Ishaq Ikharo was indicted on charges of coercion and enticement of at least nine minors. Ikharo, of San Ramon, has been in custody since June 30.

According to the indictment filed on Feb. 11, along with court documents from April 2022 to Sep. 2024, Ikharo used several online chat and gaming platforms to communicate with the children, persuading, enticing and coercing the victims to engage in sexual activity.

At the time of the alleged offenses, Ikharo was on federal supervised release after being convicted in western New York in 2023 for possession of child sex abuse material, prosecutors said. According to the FBI, Ikharo signed a plea agreement where he admitted receiving the material in his Instagram and Skype accounts from two victims, ages 12 and 15, between 2019 and 2021.

The FBI said Ikharo went by the nickname “Shaq” and possibly posed as a boy or girl through online games and online platforms, primarily targeting boys. Agents said he would use apparently filtered photos of himself while messaging children.

Gaming platforms where Ikharo was believed to have contacted victims included Call of Duty, Discord, PlayStation, Roblox, Steam and Twitch. Ikharo also had accounts on iMessage, CashApp, Google, Snapchat, TikTok, Venmo, X/Twitter and Yahoo, agents said.

The FBI has established a dedicated website seeking information from victims, which lists account usernames possibly linked to Ikharo.

Prosecutors said Ikharo next court appearance is scheduled for July 30. If convicted, he faces a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and a maximum sentence of life in prison and a $250,000 fine for each conviction.