Facebook Personas Beware
April 18th, 2011 | by Jen |An internet predator that targeted Christchurch schoolboys in New Zealand invented attractive personas and then killed them off.
Police, who describe the scam as cruel, say the 28-year-old Auckland woman used several fake online profiles – depicting young and pretty women – to befriend unsuspecting high school boys.
Information provided to The Press since the New Zealand, Fairfax-owned newspaper exposed the scam last week shows that after creating an attractive new profile, the woman would sometimes kill the fictitious person, using some of her other personas to break the news on the girl’s Facebook site.
About 40 schoolboy victims of the female Facebook predator have now been identified and police are investigating possible grounds for charging the woman.
She used a handful of false Facebook identities, including Jordz Williams, Laura Jane West, Becca Maria Jullienne and Abby Jane Zoe William.
Auckland mother Sophie Jarrett, 22, said her friend had found a video created for Abby claiming she had died and alerted her to the fact her photographs, some only a month old, had been used.
“I am horrified. I feel incredibly violated. This is just so sick.”
Her 21-year-old friend Toni Hanham, an early childhood teacher from Hamilton, was the woman whose image was used for the Becca persona. Her face was also used for the Laura West persona. Both were “killed off” by the internet predator.
Hanham told The Press she was appalled her image was used to trick the boys.
“It’s horrible. I seriously did not know what to do with myself when I found out. I was so shocked.”
Her cousin in Christchurch had rung her to tell her she was all over the front page of The Press.
“It’s really freaky. She’s used my photos to make a whole video. This person is pretty messed up.”
Hanham said she now felt like removing her Facebook page and said the episode was a lesson for others.
Jarrett said she had spoken to the Christchurch police.