Two Granbury middle school students face felony charges after rumors, threats and vulgarities were published on a fake Facebook page created in the name of a classmate, authorities say.
The girls -- ages 12 and 13 -- were arrested Monday and charged with online impersonation, a third-degree felony, Hood County Sheriff Roger Deeds said.The 12-year-old victim and her mother reported the Facebook page to authorities June 28, Deeds said. Someone had created the profile with the student's name and a posted photograph of someone who looked similar to the victim."They put cuss words and made threats toward other students and basically cultivated a bad reputation for the victim," he said.Because the victim wasn't on Facebook, she and her mother didn't realize the profile existed until it was active for about a month, he said. They had wondered why other students had started acting angry and making rude comments to the victim.The Facebook page had 63 friends, Deeds said.Sheriff's investigators monitored the Facebook page for a couple of weeks while they investigated who was behind the postings, Deeds said. One of the suspects had a "not so good relationship" with the victim for more than a year.When the girls were arrested, he said, "I think they were very surprised and upset, and I know there were a lot of tears when we had them in the office."The girls, who are not being identified because they are minors, were taken to Granbury Regional Juvenile Detention Center, Deeds said. The county attorney will prosecute the case, he said.All the girls involved were to attend Acton Middle School this fall, Deeds said.Half of U.S. teens report suffering some form of cyberbullying, according to the National Crime Prevention Council.Granbury school district Superintendent James Largent, who was hired this spring and started work this month, said that Granbury schools have anti-bullying programs but that cyberbullying is often difficult for educators to combat because it occurs off school grounds."It's unfortunate that children sometimes make these kinds of choices," he said. Cyberbullying is "just something that is part of society now."Texas has tough laws against online impersonation and harassment. After a series of nationally publicized bullying cases, state lawmakers in 2009 made it a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.The case should be a reminder to young people that impersonating someone online is not a joke, Deeds said. Statistics suggest that most victims don't report the crime."It is definitely bullying, and this is still fairly new with Facebook and the social media that is out there," Deeds said. "It's just like identity theft, but instead of trying to get a financial gain out of it you're just flat trying to hurt someone socially."It's against the law."Alex Branch, 817-390-7689Twitter: @albranch1