Philly police learned what can happen when a tech-savvy victim gets tired of waiting for help.
On Mar 12th Burglars broke into the Fishtown home of Jesse McPherson and ripped his flat-screen TV off the wall and nabbed his Xbox 360 and Apple PowerBook. A few days later, co-workers surprised McPherson with a new Xbox. When he logged on to its Internet connection, he was immediately contacted several times, via the unit's instant voice-message system, by a guy who identified himself as the thief who'd taken the original Xbox. He wanted McPherson to buy it back from him. McPherson had reached out to police but couldn't get a call back.
Frustrated he posted his story on digg.com. Within hours, the post sparked reaction from people around the world, who formed their own investigatory team to solve McPherson's case.
Using the Xbox profile of the person who had contacted McPherson in that creepy voice message, they then used an array of technologies to uncover much more info about the guy.
Like his Photobucket account. His YouTube profile (and his God-awful rap-music performance). And, finally, his name, address and phone number (which I won't reveal here, as the kid is under 18).
And that's when mob justice took over, as McPherson's supporters flooded the kid's online accounts with heckling comments and called his house nonstop, demanding the return of McPherson's stuff.
One avenger, from England, even posted a recording on YouTube of a phone call he had with the kid's furious mom, who was adamant her son wasn't a thief but had bought the Xbox from a neighborhood crack-head. Another, a reporter from New Zealand, gave McPherson's story major headline treatment.
Eventually, the kid himself contacted McPherson, begging him to call off the vigilantes, saying he hadn't broken into McPherson's house but only bragged that he had, "to be a smart-ass."
He returned the Xbox.
[philly]
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