Business

AMC CEO Adam Aron sent sexually explicit photos, texts to woman he thought did ‘unmentionable things’ as part of catfishing scheme

Adam Aron, the controversial CEO of meme-stock darling AMC Entertainment, sent sexually explicit images and text messages to a woman he thought was a ballerina who had done “unmentionable th📖ings” to him, accordinཧg to a bombshell report.

Instead, the woman tur🔜ned out to be a 34-year-old Bronx con artist who catfished and atte🍃mpted to extort the married executive, Aron admitted Thursday after the news site reported the sordid tale.

The scam surfaced in a sealed federal indictment filed in the Southern District of New York last year against Sakoya Black꧑wood, 𒊎who pleaded guilty over the summer, the outlet reported.

Aron — who was identified as “Victim 1” and described as a “public-company CEO” in the sealed indictment — sent a woman by the name of “Mia” raunchy photos that included him and another woman, sources familiar with the matter told .

Blackwood had reportedly messaged Aron in March 2022 c꧂laiming to be a 17-year-old Russianღ model.

Throughout their steamy exchange, the 69-year-old Aron — who has been married since 1987 — mistook Blackwood’s fake identity as a woman with whom he’d had a prior relationship, according to Semafor.

He asked her whether she was a ballerina𒆙 who had done “unmen𝕴tionable things” to him, according to sealed court documents obtained by Semafor.

AMC Entertainment CEO Adam Aron sent sexually explicit images and text messages while caught up in a catfishing scheme where he believed he was texting with a 17-year-old Russian ballerina. Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

Blackwood went on to fabricate a cast of characters — including a fake ex-boyfriend and a made-up Vanity Fair reporter claiming to have seen the messages — who also reached out to Aron through online burner accounts.

Through these fictitious aliases, Blackwood demanded six figures in hush money and threatened to screenshot her messages with Aron and share them with the press and AMC’s board, Semafor reported.

“Offers are coming in like crazy ppl lo🔴ve a scandal,” she texted Aron under the guise of the ex-boyfriend, per the o🐈utlet.

At one point, Blackwood even revealed she had the unlist🀅ed cell phone numbers of six AMC board directors.

The woman behind the fake alias that was chatting with Aron, “Mia,” was actually 34-year-old Sakoya Blackwood from the Bronx. Blackwood has since been arrested. DOJ

Aron, who took home a $23.7 million pay package in 2022, didn’t cough up any money and reported his predicament to the FBI and the Department of Justice, he revealed in his on X on Thursday.

In the post, Aron said he had disclosed his role in the scheme to AMC’s Board of Directors after Blackwood was sentenced to “nearly a year in jail” in July on counts of extortion and cyberstalking. She has been sentenced to time served.

“Last year I became the victim of an elaborate criminal extortion by a third party who was unknown to me related to false allegations about my personal life,” Aron penned. “With my access to resources, if I did not stand up against blackmail, who could?”

Aron is a married father. Getty Images for American Cinematheque

Representatives for AMC did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.

AMC had been on the verge of bankruptcy in 2021 but was able to avert disaster after millions of retail investors turned it into a so-called “meme stock”&nb🉐sp;— with the shares soaring to nearly $60. The stock closed at $11 on Thur🍬sday.

Aron unloaded a trove of AMC shares worth $7.1 million in January 2022, according t🎃o a Securities and Exchange Comm🍸ission filing.

It came just one year after Aron sold more than $40 million in shares, after disclosing hisღ plan in an earnings call last August.

Aron was initially identified in court documents only as a “public-company CEO.” He revealed his role in scheme in a tweet, where he also admitted that he had already told AMC’s board of the incident.

At the time, the CEO of the world’s largest movie theater chain said he was turning 67 in September, and that he was selling 🐻shares for estate planning purposes.

“Prudent estate planning suggests I should diversify my assets a bit, especially with Congress having been discussing imposing potentially soaring capital gains tax rates and significant changes to what can be passed on to one’s heirs,” said Aron, who’s now 69.