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A 19-year-old mechanic in the UK stands accused of the murder of his 15-year-old lover as part of an elaborate scheme involving blackmail and outing.
The murder in question happened in December 2019. Authorities in Cheshire discovered the body of 15-year-old Alex Rodda in a forest near the town of Ashley. Prosecutors allege that then-18-year-old Matthew Mason lured Rodda to the woods under the pretense of sex, then beat him to death with a wrench.
“Alex did not stand a chance,” prosecutor Ian Unsworth said in court. “His life ended in those woods. His partially clothed abandoned young body was discovered by a team of refuse collectors early the next morning. His trousers and underwear gathered around his ankles, suggesting that he may have been engaged in some form of sexual activity prior to the attack and thus, may well have been highly vulnerable at that time.”
Unsworth further alleged that Mason murdered Rodda “in cold blood.”
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The Manchester Evening News further reports that Rodda and Mason met on Instagram and began a flirtatious relationship. That friendship eventually became sexual, which the two maintained in secret. Rodda was openly gay, but Mason was not. When Rodda learned that Mason actually had a girlfriend of two years, he became enraged. Rodda contacted Mason’s girlfriend to inform her of the affair.
Mason denied the relationship to his girlfriend, but began sending cash payments to Rodda to keep him silent. Those payments eventually totaled more than £2,000 over a three-week period. Text messages presented in court show Mason complaining that Rodda was “cleaning him out.” Other messages showed Rodda threatening to to go the police, at one point telling Mason he “Will tell the fed and get him on sex offenders.”
During that time, Rodda also had a number of unexplained absences from school. On at least one occasion, Rodda’s mother came home unexpectedly and found he and Mason alone and “flustered” in their home.
Lawyers for Mason have equated Rodda’s threats to blackmail. Matthew Mason denies killing Alex Rodda.
charmin88
That’s sad and an unnecessary death
Ginger Tom
So sad.
Godabed
*shakes head* a mess.
Cloud
You seem to be forgetting Queerty this involves an under age child not an adult so please treat this with sensitivity for crying out loud. Why is the writer of the story forgetting this because it is disgusting? The horrific story is sad and doesn’t deserve this awful write up. A boy of 15 was murdered because an older evil man over the age of 18 took advantage of him. An affair did not happen, last time I checked a child of 15 cannot consent!!
Catholicslutbox
It should be noted that the age of consent in the UK is 16. So (socially) it’s a bit of grey area. It’s like how some guys in the US thought Emma Watson was gross until the second she hit 18. Does that one second really make a difference?
That said, Queerty should not have posted the guy’s instagram because he is under the age of 18.
It’s also tragic that he was killed, especially the way he was, but you cannot push someone to the edge, threaten to expose them, and blackmail them and NOT expect them to snap.
Stories like these are far too common.
Vince
I would feel that way if the guy was say in his 40s but a 4 years difference isn’t really that different. That’s why they have romeo and juliet laws.
Cam
There is the 3 year age difference. But you also seem to forget that the younger guy was blackmailing the other guy because he got mad he had a girlfriend. These aren’t the actions of innocent wide eyed guy. This was not going to end well.
Jake123
@Cam very surprised at you tbh. He was a child.
Cam
@Jake123
My issue is that it was painted as if the kid was attacked and was a totally innocent victim. I was simply pointing out that out of jealousy the kid was committing a felony and blackmailing the other guy, then threatened to out him etc. This wasn’t a nice guy either. Blackmail doesn’t deserve murder and the 18 year old legally should get into trouble for statutory rape.
MrMichaelJ
OK, besides the whole ‘murder’ aspect there’s a couple of really friggin annoying things about this.
1) WTF was this little piece of shite doing blackmailing someone? What’s even weirder is they met up to hook up after this. Something doesn’t add up.
2) Just like society, this newspaper labeled the older guy ‘gay’ even though he was currently involved in a two year relationship with a woman. That’s NOT ‘gay’.
Look, killing someone is obviously wrong but maybe don’t be such a little shite that you have sex with someone who isn’t out, then blackmail them and threaten to go to the police and maybe they won’t take a wrench to you while they’re f8cking you.
Derek Northcutt
Blackmail is a horrible crime but it is not a capital crime. They’re really two boys and the older boy murdered a foolish younger boy. Just tragic for every one.
Donston
So, you decided to make this tragedy all about not being “gay” and about how shitty teens are?
The media has no business “labeling” anyone and neither do you. No matter what someone’s public relationship is, what their public identity is, what their sex life is- you (and the media) don’t know anyone and what’s going on with them. You can never know the nature, dimensions or evolution of anyone’s sexuality. You don’t know what their genuine sense of self is. You don’t where they fit in the romantic, sexual, affection, emotional investment, relationship contentment spectrum. You don’t know their insecurities or how much of their life is driven by things like sociology, fear, money, ego, etc. So, the media (and you) just need to stop “labeling” folks in general, outside of whatever identities they embrace. However, when “queers” obsess with how not “gay” someone is, it tends to scream internalized homophobia, inferiority complexes and/or fetishizing DL or closeted or overall non homo-leaning dudes. While that kind of stuff is what half of your posts focus on. It makes you come off pathetic and way too focused on “labels”. And it makes it seem like you place hetero-leaning or DL or closeted dudes on a pedestal and out “gays” should feel lucky to hook up with those types of dudes. Once again, pathetic. The obsession with people being “gay” or not “gay” and the overall obsession with other people’s sex lives and their identities is partly why shit like this keeps happening. Your posts are just as much as a problem as the media’s articles.
What the 15 year old did was shitty and dangerous. But the penalty for being a dumb and shitty 15 year old should never be death, especially since that death was mostly triggered by sociology and ego. Even without the killing, the murderer still wouldn’t be a “good guy”, considering he was cheating on his gf, and he didn’t even have enough sense to inform someone he was having a persistent affair with that he was in a relationship. It’s an overall terrible story.
Cam
And the proper response to blackmail is to report it.
trsxyz
No sympathetic characters in this story.
Catholicslutbox
Would people still sympathize if he wasn’t 15?
There have been stories of blackmail here before where the comments were far from favorable when someone was threatening to out/extort someone else.
The word “reprehensible” was thrown around a lot.
Still a sad story. One life ruined and one life taken.
Openminded
CatholicSlut, I find the fact that he was 15 and blackmailing this guy reason NOT to be sympathetic. I wonder if the 19 y/o guy was the only one the ballsy kid was blackmailing. Always possible someone else he was blackmailing met in the woods for sex and killed him. Maybe the 19 y/o was the only one dumb enough to leave an electronic trail of messages. I’d like to see an accounting of the deceased bank account and see how much money he has to determine the likelyhood that he has profited off other before.
Liquid Silver
Agreed. This is not a particularly sympathetic set of characters in any way, shape, or form.
Derek Northcutt
The penalty for blackmail is not death, not even in Saudi Arabia.
jonasalden
Out of curiosity, was there also a trans aspect to this, judging by the pix?
Donston
If Alex was trans-identifying it’d likely be a part of the story.
It’s impossible to know this stuff nowadays. There are plenty of people who are altering their bodies or who present themselves as not “traditional gender normal”, but they still identify as their bio gender or they identify “non-binary” or “queer-gender”.
quantum
He denies “murdering” the kid. From the article you linked:
“The judge tells the jurors one of the issues they do not have to consider was who caused Alex Rodda’s death.
He said everyone agreed it was the defendant.
It was their task to decide whether he was guilty of murder.”
Minutes from the court proceeding show the defense making a plausible argument that the kid went into the whole situation with the intent to blackmail the defendant. It doesn’t make the situation any less awful,
My2CentsWorth
This was a very bad event. Fear can cause people to do a lot of bad things and do them, without any real thinking, or planning. It is possible that AlexRodda was the type who would forever be a horrible person, or he might have grown beyond the type of person who would do what he did to Matthew Mason.
In a way, the attitude against LGBTQ people is responsible for the bad deeds of both Alex and Matthew. Without that attitude Matthew could have been ‘out’ and Alex n out and out n out and out would not have threatened to destroy him.
Alex Rodda was being a very bad person. Matthew Mason may also be a very bad person but other than the murder there is no evidence that he was a bad person who would do very bad things without being in extreme fear of being destroyed – maybe kicked out by homophobic family – and fear of being an outcast. I am not condoning what he did but I believe that fear was motivating him.
canadiankid
This story is a tragedy. Who knows why Alex did what he did. Perhaps it was greed, or some form of revenge, or he wanted some control over Matthew. Either way what Matthew did was way worse. Alex was found with naked with his clothes around his ankles, suggesting Matthew was getting one last piece of action before bludgeoning him to death. The act of bludgeoning someone with a wrench is so brutal and violent, Matthew deserves life improsonment. Anyone capable of doing that to someone does not deserve freedom, unless in rare self-defense circumstances which this is not considering Alex’s compromised position at the time of the attack. Matthew killed him because he didn’t want to be outed and now he’s out to the world as not only bisexual, but also a murderer. Great job!
Jake123
Honestly shocked at some of the reactions on this site. He was a child!! Did he even understand blackmail. This man is evil. He deserves to be punished harshly. So quit the victim blaming!!
Sister Bertha Bedderthanyu
I know you aren’t going to believe this but Matthew Mason was a kid too in the eyes of many of us who’ve not only read the article but decided to look a little bit further into just what this crazed killer (in your eyes at least) was. He was a nineteen year old kid who had sex with a WILLING fifteen year old who knew damn well what he was doing all along. Kids grow up extremely fast and no matter how you look at it one was hellbent to ruin the life of the other. It was to be expected once Matthew figured out just how many hours he was working and just how little he was taking home thanks to a little jerk who was going to ruin his life because he couldn’t handle that he was no longer number one. That kid was no saint and was probably planning this all along. He was able to figure out how to snare Matthew but he hadn’t figured out what was going to happen once he went too far and that day came. I’m on Matthew’s side and I suggest you do a google or bing search to see that Matthew looked just as childlike and innocent as this little vamp trying to be turned into a martyr. His little ass was anything but. Matthew did work which leads me to believe he wasn’t a crazed meth head (yes, its in England too). In a few of those pics posted online I’m given the impression it might have been Alex that dipped in the stuff. He looks high in several pics posted. Matthew must have been laying some serious pipe to that ass. They look like a casting call for a Helix video.
Jake123
@Sister Bertha Really your on the MURDERERS side. For all we know Mason was the one to suggest payment to keep Alex quiet. I don’t feel sorry for him. My sympathies lie with the victim and his family. 15.
My2CentsWorth
Both were children. What Matt did was horrible. I think that he did it out of fear. It is an unfortunate situation for both of them (which Alex is not aware of now) and if society’s attitude toward LBGTQ people had been decent there would likely not have existed a situation in which Alex could blackmail Matt.
Cam
He seems to have understood blackmail well enough to take $2000 pounds from the guy, then when the guy was having trouble paying more, threatening to out him. That sounds like a very good understanding of how blackmail works.
Jake123
@Cam I’m just thinking about my little brother who’s only 15. At the end of the day a child has been murdered there’s no rationalising that, blackmail or not.
Cam
@Jake123
Except you keep trying to change the topic. You said “Did he even understand blackmail?”.
I pointed out the fact that since he took $2000 pounds from the guy, and then threatened him if he didn’t get him more, that yes, he apparently understood it very well. You are now trying to change that topic that you started because you didn’t like the fact that your original premise was proved false.
Not sure what you’re going for here. You seem to have a really old fashioned view that a crime victim must always be an angle or there is no crime. The 18 year old murdered and committed statutory rape and is no doubt going to jail, deservedly. The 15 year old committed blackmail, this doesn’t mean he deserved to be murdered, but it was a fact stated in the article.
Not sure why you seem to enraged that this was pointed out.
Jake123
@Cam What about my original premise was proved false?? And what about my post makes you think I’m enraged ?? I don’t think this child understood the seriousness of what he was doing, he’s a child. Unfortunately he’ll never learn that lesson. I personally feel that rationalising this murder with well he was being blackmailed by a child is not good enough tbh. At the end of the day Alex was a child.
Sister Bertha Bedderthanyu
Jake, this boils down to what I saw, what you saw and what happened, a kid being killed by another kid. The pic you see is of Alex and sadly (but well worth the search) you have to do a search to see what Matthew looked like, an innocent looking kid who happened to enjoy having sex with another kid. Ok, Matthew was older than Alex but in todays world you can go on Xtube, Xhamsterlive, you name it and see young boys their age (damn the fact that Alex was only fifteen going on thirty) playing with huge toys and having unprotected sex with each other including cream pies and swallowing. And its all live and in living color. Just name the race and sex act that turns you on and there are no less than twenty at your service. These kids are not innocent anymore or lets just say I sure as hell think before I tell the executioner to start grinding his ax. If you look at more pictures of Alex I’ll bet your opinion of him will change. The same as your seeing Matthew as a remorseless killer.
Jake123
@Sister Bertha yeah I’m not even going to touch on whatever that is above me.
Cloud
Exactly!! A lot of people on here seem to conveniently forget the victim was 15 and likely younger when he met the monster. An 18-19 yr is not a kid, he was a young adult unlike the real child. He took advantage of the child, possibly groomed the boy and sexually assaulted the boy. This wasn’t a equal relationship, it wasn’t even a relationship. Regardless if he was blackmailing the monster because how do we know if he wasn’t making it up? A child does not deserve to be murdered. People on here should quit victim blaming the boy.
Sister Bertha Bedderthanyu
@Jake123……….Its all good, Jake. No doubt you looked at saw/thought the same thing I did (that Alex was a fifteen year old “Miss Thing” with a black book loaded with victims whose only mistake was liking him).
My2CentsWorth
I read, maybe in a British paper, about the text exchanges between Alex and a friend. I got the impression that Matt was not Alex’s only encounter, or the first. Conditioning, or grooming, Alex might not have needed to take place. Obviously, for Matt it was a horrible deed to do. But we should try to comprehend what was going on for Matt. Alex is not without blame for what happened to him. Regardless of the bad thing that Matt did. An 18 – 19 years old is not a child but they are still [should be] developing. As I stated before, fear can make people do bad things. Just like hate.