photo by: Chris Conde/Journal-World

Devaris L. Howard is pictured at his trial on Nov. 8, 2023, in Douglas County District Court. Howard was convicted by a jury of extorting a woman for nude photographs of herself.

Updated at 5:02 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 8

A Douglas County jury convicted a man on Wednesday of felony sexual extortion after he threatened to release nude pictures of a woman taken when she was a teen. The jury could not agree on a second count of the same crime.

The man, Devaris Lamar Howard, 21, of Gadsden, Alabama, was charged in Douglas County District Court with two felony counts of sexual extortion. The charges related to a series of incidents between August and October of 2022, as the Journal-World reported.

The woman testified at trial on Monday that over the course of three months a man she did not know threatened her multiple times to send nude images of her that were taken when she was 13 years old to her family and to post them online. The woman sent the anonymous man photos and had an explicit video call with the man in response to his threats. Lawrence police later identified the man as Howard while he was living in Alabama, and he was taken into custody by Alabama police, as the Journal-World reported.

A jury of eight women and four men returned the verdict Wednesday afternoon after a day of deliberations.

photo by: Chris Conde/Journal-World

Devaris Howard, left, and his attorney, Cooper Overstreet, are pictured during Howard’s trial just after the jury returned a guilty verdict on one count of sexual extortion, on Nov. 8, 2023, in Douglas County District Court.

Howard was free on a $15,000 bond in connection with the charges until late October when charges were filed against him in Alabama. His attorney, Cooper Overstreet, asked the court to reinstate his bond and to take him into custody to avoid his being extradited to Alabama — so that if he were convicted on his Kansas charges, he would be earning time toward his sentence.

According to the Etowah County Sheriff’s Office, Howard has two active warrants in Etowah County, Alabama, in connection with one felony count of sex abuse and one felony count of sodomy. He is being held in the Douglas County Jail on a $100,000 bond in connection with those warrants.

Howard is next scheduled to appear in court on Nov. 22 for a status conference where the state will announce if it plans to retry Howard on the hung count and for the court to schedule a sentencing date. Howard is also facing an additional misdemeanor charge for attempting to violate a protection order in connection with the sexual extortion case for an alleged incident on Nov. 6, 2022, according to court records.