NEED TO KNOW
- The estate of Miranda Corsette, a 16-year-old Florida girl who was allegedly tortured, murdered and dismembered after meeting a man on Grindr, is suing the LGBTQ dating app
- Police have identified the suspect as Steven Gress, who is in jail awaiting trial on charges including murder and kidnapping, and will face the death penalty if convicted
- Corsette was allegedly left unrecognizable after being beaten by Gress for a week and then suffocated after a billiard ball was shoved in her mouth and her head covered in plastic wrap
The estate of a Florida teenager who was allegedly tortured and then killed after meeting a man on Grindr is suing the LGBTQ dating app.
Miranda Corsette, 16, “endured relentless physical and sexual abuse at the hands of the Grindr user,” according to a copy of the federal civil suit filed in Florida Middle District Court and obtained by PEOPLE.
Police have identified that man as 35-year-old Steven Gress, who is now in custody and awaiting trial on charges including first-degree murder and kidnapping, according to Pinellas County court records. The State’s Attorney’s Office has filed a motion stating that it will be seeking the death penalty if a jury convicts Gress of murder in connection with Corsette’s death.
The civil suit alleges that Gress “savagely beat [Corsette], targeting her body with such ferocity that she was left battered, swollen, and unrecognizable.”
Then, after enduring a week of torture, Gress and his girlfriend allegedly killed Corsette, police — and now the civil suit — allege.
“On or about February 24, 2025, [the victim’s] life was brutally extinguished when at the Grindr user’s direction, a pool ball wrapped in a sock was shoved into M.C.’s mouth and, with the pool ball in the mouth, M.C.’s head and face were wrapped in Saran Wrap, obstructing her airways and suffocating her,” alleges the civil suit.
The civil suit goes on to claim: “This final act of violence, suffocating a defenseless minor child already broken by days of torture, was the culmination of a week-long torture caused and set in motion by Grindr’s dangerous sex hook-up app that ensnared the child into a deadly trap.”
The estate lists nine causes of action for which they are seeking damages, including wrongful death, negligence, intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, participation in a sex trafficking venue and deceptive and unfair trade practices.
“Grindr’s negligent conduct directly set in motion the chain of events that exposed M.C. to danger,” states the civil suit. “The acts of M.C.’s attacker were not independent of Grindr’s wrongdoing but were facilitated and made substantially more probable by Grindr’s deliberate failure to implement meaningful safeguards against underage access and exploitation.”
In an interview with detectives from the Saint Petersburg Police Department, Gress allegedly confessed to beating the teenager after suspecting her of stealing his ring.
“Gress stated that for the better part of a week he ‘lumped her up,'” reads a copy of the arrest warrant obtained by PEOPLE. “Gress stated that he explained to Corsette he had just gotten out of prison, and he had never had anything of his own, so the ring was very special to him and he was not willing to let her steal it from him.”
He also claimed that he pleaded with Corsette to get his ring back but she would just “mock him,” according to a copy of the probable cause affidavit filed in the case.
Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLE’s free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases.
At some point, Gress called his girlfriend, Michelle Brandes, 35, and asked her to help him retrieve his ring. She allegedly began beating Corsette as well and, according to claims by both Gress and a third roommate who often stayed at the home, it was Brandes who allegedly killed the girl, the affidavit states.
“Brandes took a ball from a pool table in the backyard, put it in a sock and shoved it down Corsette’s throat and then wrapped her face in plastic wrap,” the affidavit alleges. “Gress stated that he told Brandes not to cover the nose, but Brandes did and he couldn’t get to Corsette quick enough to poke holes in the plastic before she died.”
That third roommate also alleged to police that Gress was “very abusive” and “would find disadvantaged women and girls who were either homeless or addicted to drugs” when trying to pick up women, according to the warrant.
In her interview with police, the third roommate also said that “she felt Brandes had taken the ring in order to get Gress to not like the girl because she was jealous,” according to the warrant.
On Feb. 23, the third roommate traveled with Gress, Brandes and Corsette’s corpse to the home of Brandes’ mother, the warrant says. Once there, Gress allegedly decapitated and dismembered Corsette’s body while Brandes placed the remains into trash bags.
On Feb. 24, the three traveled to a Popeye’s restaurant and a miniature golf course to celebrate Brandes’ birthday with Corsette’s remains in the trunk of the car, the third roommate alleged to detectives seeking a search warrant.
According to the affidavit, the trio then disposed of the body in a dumpster.
By the time police learned of this, the dumpster had been emptied and its contents put in an incinerator, making it impossible to recover the teenager’s body.
“This desecration of M.C.’s body has left her family in profound anguish, robbed of the ability to lay her to rest or find closure through a proper burial,” the lawsuit states.
Grindr has not yet filed a response to the civil suit and did not respond to a request for comment.
Read the full article here
