Prosecutors: Man Shared Plot To Kill Classmate On Facebook
(CBS) -- Police say an Alsip teen went too far with a Facebook post.
Thomas Braasch, 19, is charged with threatening a classmate at Alan Shephard High School in Palos Heights on Facebook.
His Facebook page is still up, but the post where he made the threat is gone. But there are witnesses who saw it.
According to student Brian Pioppo, the post said, "He was going to bring up all his friends and actually shoot the kid on school campus. It was all over a freshman girl."
Some students who saw the post alerted their parents who then called the school.
"Sometimes people are down on social media. In this case, for this incident at least, we're up for it," said District 218 Superintendent John Byrne.
Armed with the evidence from social media, Thursday morning school administrators met the 19-year-old senior and his 16-year-old alleged target at the bus stop.
"The boys were frisked immediately and he had no weapon," said Byrne.
Security also searched the school for weapons, a precaution students and parents supported.
"You can't let things escalate. If they just let it slide he might get more serious," said Roger Berman, a parent.
Braasch faces a felony charge of disorderly conduct for using social media to threaten harm to a student at a school. His father defended him.
"They got Thomas with the now and they don't tell the truth. He made threats to my son first on that Wednesday night."
