A man from Albany, New York was sentenced to 13 years in prison for raping four teenage girls he met on Facebook.
David Bradt used Facebook to meet more than 700 girls, mostly between the ages 15 and 20.
According to the Times Union, he would first ‘friend’ one teenager on Facebook, then send friend request to all her friends.
He was arrested after the mother of a 16-year-old girl became concerned over unusual text messages her daughter received from him.
Albany County District Attorney David Soares told reporters Bradt targeted high-school cliques and exploited them.
“When he was ‘friending’ one girl and he was able to see her list of friends, he was basically using those girls as leads, like you would in a business…That’s how he was venturing into these other networks and was able to identify and find all of his prey,” Times Union quotes Soares.
Bradt pleaded guilty to four counts of third-degree rape for having sex with underage victims.
This isn’t the first time sexual offenders have use Facebook to find their prey. Users should exercise more caution in their judgments when accepting/making friends on social networks.
More than 3,500 registered sex offenders in New York have been kicked from social-networking sites, Facebook and MySpace. This is the first time that the new e-Stop (Electronic Security and Targeting of Online Predators) act of 2008 has actually been used.
Under the state’s e-STOP Act, registered offenders are required to register their emails and other online identifiers with the state so that their online activities can be monitored. Sex offenders have 10 days to notify the state after creating new online profiles or face prosecution for a new felony.
It will be good to see more and more of these pervs who prey on the naive and defenceless cyberspace kids be rounded up and put aside.
There has been a lot of incidents regarding social networking sites lately and also a few recent calls for Facebook to actively do some background-check of its users, which is obviously almost impossible. But it’s nice to see the New York law enforcers taking this proactive stance on the issue of online prevs.
This act will be more effective if the other States and countries adopts it. Also hoping that more social-networking sites come forward to help the law enforcers in their quest to protect the minors.
Source [ NY dailynews]
