Saturday, March 24, 2012

Signs Of Trouble Revealed On Woman's Facebook Page Before Jesup Murder/Suicide

CEDAR RAPIDS, IA (CBS2/FOX28) - On Friday Buchanan County Attorney Shawn Harden revealed new details in a tragic murder suicide in Jesup.

Harden said that a Facebook post could have been the catalyst that put the whole event in motion. An event that ended with Lindsay Nichols? ex-boyfriend, Tim Roses, shooting her before killing himself in front of her new boyfriend?s Jessup home.

Nichols' Facebook wall reveals a young woman fearing for her safety since a February break-up with Roses. Harden said Roses had repeatedly told Nichols that he was going to leave his wife. When that didn?t happen, Nichols ended the relationship. However Harden said, Roses wasn?t willing to let Nichols go.

One post from Nichols? wall reads, "I really don't think that I should feel unsafe because I feel I am being watched," Nichols said.

A second post tells friends that her ex-boyfriend, Tim Roses, may be trying to friend them to keep an eye on her

Yet, it was a relationship status change that, ?May have brought it all to a head,? Harden said.? Nichols changed her Facebook status from single to in a new relationship on Wednesday just before her muder.

?She's saying I feel like I'm being watched, in a way it's ironic she is being watched on Facebook," Emily Muhlbach, who oversees social media at Mount Mercy University said.

"I think it's so alarming that a single post can lead to something so traumatic if indeed that was the way it went.,? Muhlbach added.
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She explained that social media evokes a false sense of security.

?Whatever you post could multiply almost exponentially and that's hard to think through when you're overwhelmed by something going on in life,? Mulbach said.

Women in Cedar Rapids said they're aware of the dangers. One woman even said she only uses her initials and not her name on Facebook for safety reasons.

?I don't have my maiden name. I don't have the town I live in," she said.

Others said they too closely monitor their online privacy.

"That whole I'm going to check into this place on Facebook, I'm not into people knowing where I?m at all the time," Cedar Rapids resident Melissa Parks said.

Yet, even with safety concerns others said they filter what they say, but do still maintain a large number of friends online.

?I have about 600 Facebook friends and I'm pretty sure all of them see everything I put on there," Cedar Rapids resident Tara Neally said.

The connection between social media and Lindsay Nichols' death isn't the first. Just last week jurors handed down the first every guilty verdict in a hate crime for online invasion of privacy. Dharun Ravi, 20, faces up to 10 years in prison and could face deportation to India because he is not an American citizen.

Ravi?s roommate, Rutgers University student Tyler Clementi, committed suicide after a Ravi broadcast a romantic meeting between Clementi and another man.

Signs Of Trouble Revealed On Woman's Facebook Page Before Jesup Murder/Suicide

Friday, March 23 2012, 09:21 PM CDT

Source: http://www.kgan.com/shared/newsroom/top_stories/videos/kgan_vid_10468.shtml?wap=0

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