Two girls, aged 15 and 16, have pleaded guilty to posting harassing messages on their Twitter and Facebook accounts aimed at another young girl that had been raped, and the two had been angry that her attackers had been found guilty, as reported by the Huffington Post.
Two high school football players were found guilty of raping a teen girl after an alcohol-fueled party in West Virginia last August. At the time of their conviction on March 17, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine demanded an end to the repeated Internet threats aimed at the victim.
The 16 year-old girl was charged with aggravated menacing. According to the attorney general's office, one of her tweets, that threatened homicide, read, "you ripped my family apart."
The 16 year-old is also the cousin of one of the convicted boys.
The 15 year-old girl was charged with menacing. She had threatened the victim with bodily harm on Twitter, and later, on her Facebook page.
DeWine said, "People have the right to express their point of view, and they have the right to be stupid, and they have the right to be wrong, but they don't have the right under Ohio law to threaten to kill someone. What's sad particularly to me is that the victim has had to go through the rape, the aftermath of the rape, the trial, and she continues to be victimized on the social media."
The victim, and her family, had been threatened via social media more than once according to DeWine.
The rape itself unfolded via social networking: A 12-minute YouTube video captured students making obscene jokes about the victim on the same night of the attack.
The original charges against the two girls included intimidation of a victim, telecommunications harassment and aggravated menacing. They were both held without bond at the Jefferson County Juvenile detention center.
The two boys have since been sentenced to a minimum of one-year in juvenile prison.
In court, both girls admitted to have "made bad tweets." After pleading guilty, the two girls were sentenced to 6 months probation.
Sara Gasser, an attorney for one of the girls said that both admitted to a single misdemeanor charge of telecommunications harassment.
Further speculation, stemming from the same case, has highlighted school officials for text messages the two boys had sent that sounded like their head football coach may have been aware of the rape early on. In one such message, one of the boys texted that coach R.S. "took care of it."
In another text the boy said his coach "was joking about it so I'm not worried."
The older boy was also convicted for photographing the victim while naked.
Social networking is just one more thing to be aware about, whether your charges are directly or indirectly related to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or another Internet site. Contact a criminal defense attorney to discuss your own case right away!
