9 Most Bizarre Facebook Related Crimes

1

The woman who was arrested for ‘poking' someone on Facebook

In yet another case of blurring between the lines of virtual and reality, a woman broke the law for poking via Facebook! Shannon Jackson of Tennessee broke the law when she poked a contact on her Facebook list, by violating a restraining order.

The order specifically prohibits either telephoning, contacting, or otherwise communicating with the petitioner. Violation of a restraining order in Tennessee is a class A misdemeanor, punishable up to 11 months and 29 days in jail, as well as a fine up to $2500. (Source | Via)

2

The man who got arrested for pretending to be a Moroccan prince on Facebook

In the U.S., pretending to be a celebrity online is something of a trend. There's a whole slew of fake celebrity blogs out there. Search Facebook or MySpace and you'll find dozens of pages supposedly opened by Tom Cruise or Katie Holmes -- all fake.

The Moroccan government, though, apparently isn't quite hip with this trend, and in 2008 arrested a man for creating a Facebook profile under the guise of the brother of King Mohammed VI.

The man, 26-year-old Fouad Mourtada, was arrested and charged with "villainous practices," a very dire and vague sounding offense. At this point, it's unknown just what he said on the fake profile and whether his intents were malicious or satirical, but it's safe to say that whatever he was doing with the fake Facebook identity wasn't terribly amusing to the Moroccan government. (Source | Via)

3

The emergency worker who got 4 years in jail for posting crime scene photos on Facebook

Mark Musarella, an emergency worker who posted photos on Facebook of a beaten and strangled woman called Caroline Wimme, was sentenced to 200 hours of community service after pleading guilty to misdemeanor official misconduct and disorderly conduct. The 48-year-old retired New York Police Department detective also lost his emergency medical technician license.

Now, the parents are suing Facebook for allowing the pictures to be shown. (Source | Via)

4

The woman who was convicted for decapitating a mouse and posting the footage on Facebook

A young Queensland woman has escaped jail time over an animal cruelty case, in which she filmed herself hacking off a mouse's head before posting the footage on Facebook. Naomi Anderson, 23, pleaded guilty to one charge of animal cruelty in the Caboolture Magistrates Court, north of Brisbane, in July 2011. The Caboolture woman had used a steak knife to cut off the mouse's head, filming the episode and later uploading it onto Facebook using an alias. The mouse took 40 seconds to die.

Anderson received an 18-month good behaviour bond and was ordered to serve 180 hours community service. (Source)

5

The two preteen girls who were accused of cyberstalking after hacking into a classmate's Facebook page

Two preteen US girls accused of hacking into a classmate's Facebook page and posting sexually explicit photos and messages have been charged with cyberstalking and first-degree computer trespassing. The girls, ages 11 and 12, have been under investigation since the alleged victim's family contacted Issaquah police. The two defendants used the victim's password information to post sexually explicit content on her Facebook page. They also posted messages that indicated the victim was willing to perform sex acts on people.

The defendants instant-messaged some boys to arrange dates where sex acts were to be performed by the victim, according to the charges. Jon Knight, the stepfather of the 12-year-old victim, said his family is relieved that the case has resulted in criminal charges. He said that he wasn't taken seriously when he reported the incident to Issaquah police and to staff at Issaquah Middle School. (Source)

6

The couple who was arrested for eating rare iguana on Facebook

This story concerns an American couple's meal of an endangered iguana that landed them in Bahamian jail. They were caught after the country's officials saw pictures of the feast on Facebook. The couple -- Vanessa Starr Palm, 23, from Illinois and Alexander Daniel Rust, 24, from Indiana -- posted incriminating snapshots that included "the suspects catching an iguana, parts of an iguana on a grill, two men eating the iguana pieces, and a man and a woman cleaning what appears to be undersized conch," according to police. It's unclear exactly how it got to the police, but apparently many people reported it.

Palm and Rust have been charged with violating an animal protection act and were released on $500 bail each. They'll be back in court next Tuesday. As if that wasn't enough, a Bahamian official said the pair "could also be charged under U.S. law which makes it illegal to commit an offence in a country that has a relationship with the U.S." Good.

The iguanas are protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Florida. (Source | Via)

7

The PA teen who admitted to trying to hire a hitman on Facebook

Chester County teenager faces 11 to 22 years in prison after agreeing to a plea agreement on charges he used Facebook to try to hire a hit man to kill a woman who had accused him of rape. Nineteen-year-old West Chester, Pa., resident Corey Christian Adams accepted the plea agreement on charges of rape, criminal solicitation of murder and other counts.

In July 2010, a 20-year-old woman who had accused Adams of raping her after a party called police to point out a posting on his Facebook page offering $500 for "a girls head." In a later posting, police say Adams said "he needed this girl knocked off right now." Neither Adams nor his attorney commented outside court. (Source)

8

The man who got jailtime for Facebook friend request

When you have a restraining order out against you, you need to be careful when playing around on social networks. A 37-year-old British man had been given a no-contact order after harassing his wife with text messages and phone calls. When he joined Facebook, he checked the box that would invite his entire address book to join as well. In Silicon Valley, that's just an annoying social faux pas. But for him, it was a violation of his no-contact rule. He received ten days in jail, but served only seven after his lawyer petitioned the court that he had been "confused" by Facebook's sign-in procedures. Good thing he didn't poke her. (Source)

9

The teen who was busted after posting about toilet crime on Facebook

Consider this 16-year-old's chances of avoiding Internet infamy flushed down the drain: After playing a prank that resulted in $247,000 worth of repairs and a five-month closure of a public library because of flooded toilets, he wrote about it on Facebook, which led to a public admission of guilt in court. This crime happened in Portsmouth, UK, where the teen boy confessed to using toilet tissue to fill the plugholes in the third-floor men's toilets of the Portsmouth Central Library and turning on the taps, resulting in an epic flood.

The teenager had apparently tried to protest his innocence at first. But he changed his plea when presented with proof of his vandalism: A transcript of the Facebook comments he made with one of his mates in which he copped to the deed.

While he had told the cops he had done nothing, he had answered a question on Facebook as to whether he might be guilty. His reply: "Kind of, yeah. I've kept it to myself. A few mates know." (Source)

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