Cadet leader posed as girl on Snapchat, jury told

An Army Cadets instructor and former councillor posed as a teenage girl on the messaging app Snapchat to encourage boys to send him nude photos, a court has heard.

Rylan Ray, who was a detachment commander for the youth organisation in Peterborough, went on trial earlier accused of 25 sexual offences, many of them involving children.

The 26-year-old, of Westgate in the city, denies the charges.

Prosecutor Claire Matthews told Ipswich Crown Court that Ray had created a "fake persona of a teenage girl" to extract embarrassing photos from his alleged victims.

The charges include one count of rape, four of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity, and three of making indecent images of children.

Offences are alleged to have happened over a six-year period and involve 11 male complainants, many of whom were cadets.

Ray also held positions at two schools in the Peterborough area and served as a local councillor, Matthews said.

"The roles he held inevitably commanded respect from those around him and they granted access to young people around him," the barrister told the jury.

His position meant he could "add cadets to WhatsApp" or other social media platforms to talk about their duties, Matthews explained.

"But in many instances he would use them to encourage them to engage in Snapchat conversations," she added.

"Where the communications would become sexual in nature."

One boy, who was aged between 13 and 14 when the alleged abuse took place, told police he felt like he had to comply with Ray's requests for explicit images.

"He would dump his mental health on me and said the only distraction from his mental health was me doing that," the teenager said in a police interview played to the court.

Matthews said several boys reported being contacted on Snapchat by a user purporting to be a girl named Chelsea, who sent intimate images of a female.

Some of the boys returned similar photos of themselves.

The IP address linked to the Snapchat account was traced back to Ray's home address, the prosecutor said.

"Also found on his handset was the icon used by Chelsea on her Snapchat account," she said.

"That was Chelsea," she added, pointing to Ray in the dock.

Matthews said Ray was asked in a police interview if he was Chelsea, to which he responded: "Not me, absolutely not."

The court was told inappropriate photos and videos of children were found on Ray's devices – including 73 of the most serious Category A classification.

Not everyone pictured had yet been identified.

Ray was first elected to represent Eye, Thorney and Newborough as a Conservative on Peterborough City Council in 2022 and more recently sat as an independent.

He did not stand for re-election in the May 2026 elections.

The trial, expected to last four weeks, continues.

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