UPDATE: Some Threats Removed After Philadelphia DA Takes On Facebook Over Alleged Witness Intimidation
By Steve Tawa
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Some of the threatening posts on a man's Facebook page have now been removed, announced Philadelphia district attorney Seth Williams.
Williams had written a letter to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, insisting that the social media site take down a Philadelphia user's postings which the DA says threaten a witness in a local gun case.
Philadelphia DA Seth Williams said the postings on 22-year old Freddy Henriquez's page threaten a witness. Williams also alleged that one of Henriquez's alleged drug crew, "RRR," advocated killing snitches.
Henriquez even posted the victim's statement to police (portion below), which was obtained through a family member who is said to run with Henriquez's gang.
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Williams says one of his assistants with the Gun Violence Task Force tried repeatedly to get the documents taken down, with no success.
The DA said the actions are perplexing given the fact that these images clearly violate two of the items in Facebook's statement of rights and responsibilities: that users will not bully, harass, or intimidate any user, and will not use Facebook to do anything unlawful, misleading, or discriminatory.
Read DA William's letter to Mark Zuckerberg (.pdf format)
Henriquez has been charged locally with witness intimidation, retaliation, and making terroristic threats. He is being held in lieu of $250,000 bail.
A second person, David Ruiz, who is related to the witness, is being held on $300,000 bail in connection with an illegal purchase of a firearm.
As of about 5 p.m. on Monday, the DA released information that some of the posts has been taken off of Henriquez's Facebook page, but there are still images of Henriquez and his friend David Ruiz calling for all "rats" to be killed "point blank period."
Officials said there is no information indicating that Facebook removed the posts.
