TheTrenchcoat Chronicles

Category: Classifieds Crime

  • Beware craigslist bearing iPods

    Beware craigslist bearing iPods

    Meridian Man Arrested in Park with a Knife:

    This story comes to us from the bustling metropolis of Boise, Idaho, and it’s a rather bizarre tale. It seems there was an ad on craigslist for a free iPod Nano. Too good to be true, you say? You have no idea.

    “I responded to it with the anticipation that several other people would because it seemed a little odd,” said a woman, we’re calling Sarah to hide her identity.

    Sarah heard back almost immediately.

    “I did get response back from him with a little story about how he had a wife cheating on him and he needed to take her ipod from her and give it away because of the situation he had with her,” said Sarah.

    The man told Sarah he was going to hide the Ipod from his wife in a public place and arrange for someone to take it.

    All she had to do was show up to at the Youth Sports Complex Park on McMillan Road around 10:30 p.m.

    Those who responded to the ad were told to come to this porta potty and that the Ipod would be right in front of the toilet paper holder

    “It sounded very odd so what my husband and I did was get the emergency dispatch number for the police… drove past the park saw a car sitting there,” said Sarah.

    Sarah says the car was right next to the porta potty.

    She and her husband drove across the street to a near by shopping area and called Boise police.

    They responded quickly and took the man into custody.

    “The police told us that he had a black nylon mask on his face, a lap top in his car that he had been email people on, a black pair of gloves a butcher knife and a beebe gun,” said Sarah.

    32-year-old, Stephen Donald Newman, of Meridian was arrested and charged with 2 misdemeanors – being in a park after hours and carrying a concealed weapon.

    Since no felony had been committed, he was able to quickly bond out of jail.

    Now that Newman is free, Sarah is afraid of retaliation which is why she has chosen to hide her identity.

    And what did craigslist have to say? The usual…

    We attempted to reach Craigslist for comment but have not yet heard back from them.

    Craigslist says that their ads are policed by its users. But in this case, every cop is a criminal.

  • craigslist job interview gone wrong

    craigslist job interview gone wrong

    Woman: Craigslist Ad Leads To Inappropriate Interview:

    This is a new one to me, since people who place employment ads on craigslist have to actually pay for the ad. I guess you can’t even trust employment ads on the internet’s hive of scum and villainy.

    PHILADELPHIA — A Conshohocken woman said she was just looking for work when an online ad on Craigslist caught her eye.

    Aleshia Endy, 22, said she now hopes police catch the man who ran the ad.

    “I thought it was a legit position. I really thought it was something, but now I’m grossed out,” Endy said.

    Endy said the job ad on the nationwide Web site, Craigslist.com, appeared to be perfect for her.

    “I responded to it, said apply for personal assistant/office manager, so I sent my picture and resume,” Endy said.

    Endy said she later found out that when the author wrote “female preferred” and “obey instructions” in the ad, he meant it.

    After responding to the ad, Endy called her potential employer, Eber Devine.

    Endy said Devine told her he was moving from one office to another, so he wanted to set up the interview at the University of Pennsylvania campus at the Van Pelt Library.

    “He met me outside. We went upstairs to where there’s, like, conference rooms,” Endy said.

    Endy said, at first, everything seemed fine. She filled out an application and agreed to a background check, and he promised her a generous salary.

    But right in the middle of the interview came the shocker.

    “He told me, ‘I want you to stand up. Go walk around the room. Go stand in the corner. I want to look at your ass,’” Endy said.

    Endy said she told him no, and when she started to walk away it became uncomfortable.

    “He stood up. He came over and started touching my shoulders and my chest and got real close and started breathing on me heavily,” Endy said.

    Endy said she pushed him away and left, but Devine had Endy’s cell phone number from the application and apparently was not finished talking.

    “Yeah, Aleshia, I think you are an excellent candidate,” one message said.

    “He called me about six times. I have it in my call log,” Endy said.

    Endy contacted the NBC 10 Investigators and the police.

    NBC 10’s Harry Hairston started looking into Devine’s background and found pages and pages of court records.

    Court documents show Devine’s criminal history goes back as far as 1986.

    NBC 10’s investigation turned up five different mug shots, some of which were taken between 2002 and December 2006.

    The self-proclaimed CEO also has a laundry list of guilty pleas.

    Records show he pleaded guilty to theft of leased property, unlawful use of a computer, forgery, and criminal conspiracy.

    NBC 10 went to Devine’s Philadelphia home. The 38-year-old self-styled entrepreneur lives with his father.

    Hairston asked Devine’s father if he knew anything about the ad on Craigslist.

    “That’s something he’s doing. He’s a grown man. I don’t know anything about it,” Devine’s father said.

    Hours after the visit, Devine called NBC 10. He wouldn’t go on camera, but he did admit to placing the ad on Craigslist, claiming to be the CEO of his own company and interviewing Endy.

    Devine denies anything inappropriate happened during the interview,

    That may be for a court to decide. The district attorney’s Office has issued a warrant for his arrest.

    He’s facing charges of sexual harassment, false imprisonment, indecent assault, unlawful restraint and burglary.

    “I just want him off the streets. I want the women out there to know what kind of person he is. I want him off the streets,” Endy said.

    Police said they are looking for Devine.

    And a spokeperson for Craigslist said illegal activity is forbidden on Craigslist by the company’s terms of use, and is not welcome on the site.

    I can almost see the craigslist spokesperson winking as they said that.

  • Woman disappears after meeting craigslist date

    Woman disappears after meeting craigslist date

    2 Sought in Calif. Missing Student Case:

    Authorities said Friday they want to question two men in the disappearance of a 19-year-old college student who had met one of the men on the Internet.

    San Diego State University student Donna Jou was last seen by her brother on June 23 getting on a motorcycle with a man she had met on the Web site Craigslist.com, said Orange County sheriff’s spokesman Jim Amormino. He said the man had been identified only as Kyle or “Skinny Puppy.”

    Investigators also were looking for registered sex offender John Steven Burgess, who rents the house where Jou apparently went that night for a party.

    “We’re not calling them suspects at this stage, but we want to question them,” Amormino said.

    The day after Jou left for the party, her mother received a text message from her cell phone saying she was coming home, but she never arrived, Amormino said.

    And yet no state attorney general inquest into craigslist yet. Why is that?

  • Ex-US Weekly editor busted on craigslist

    Ex-US Weekly editor busted on craigslist

    Fmr. US Weekly Editor Tried to Have Sex With Minor:

    You just never know what’s lurking in people’s closets.

    A former US Weekly editor was sentenced to six years in prison for using the Internet to try to have sex with a 13-year-old girl. Federal prosecutors say Timothy McDarrah responded to an FBI posting on “Craigslist” offering to pay $200 for sex with a minor.

    The FBI says McDarrah asked “What it’ll cost for the cutest white 14-year-old girl with a pony tail in the whole 8th grade?” Investigators say he later communicated with 13 year-old “Julie” wanting to provide her with “sex lessons.” The 45 year-old writers was convicted back in December after an eight day trial.

    You’d think a journalist would have better instincts than that. Oh well, one more predator behind bars.

  • Pimped his handicapped sister for sex on craigslist

    Pimped his handicapped sister for sex on craigslist

    Man accused of advertising mentally challenged sister on craigslist for sex:

    I wish I was making this one up.

    A Las Vegas man is under arrest accused of sexually assaulting his mentally challenged sister and attempting to offer her for sex out on the internet. 34-year-old Rodney Nickerson is being held on $800,000 bail.

    According to a police report, Nickerson admitted to putting a photo of his 36-year-old sister on craigslist website. The ad featuring his sister apparently asked men if they wanted to have sex with her.

    The report states Nickerson also fondled his sister and had another man touch her as well.

    Whatever jail time this scumbag receives will never be enough.

  • It’s not craigslist’s fault

    It’s not craigslist’s fault

    Legal experts absolve craigslist on sex ads:

    A fancy lawyerin’ type person says that craigslist is not responsible for their ads for illegal stuff like drugs and prostitution.

    In the wake of an FBI raid on the home of a Sacramento photographer for allegedly posting photos of underage prostitutes on craigslist, experts said the huge online classified site has no responsibility for policing such behavior.

    In fact, federal law specifically exempts online services from such liability, said Lauren Gelman, associate director of the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford University Law School.

    Gelman said the federal Communications Decency Act, passed in 1996, exempts online services such as craigslist, America Online and Yahoo from liability for the content that their users post.

    “If craigslist was accused of committing a criminal act, they would be liable,” Gelman said. “But for hosting pictures, there wouldn’t be any liability.”

    Well, isn’t that special?

    That still doesn’t change it from being a wretched hive of scum and villainy. They may not be legally responsible but how about, I know this is a foreign concept to most, morally responsible?

    It’s only a matter of time before one of these girls gets killed, if one hasn’t been already. Not to mention the fact that these ads are advertising things that are illegal.

    I know, you think prostitution and drugs should be legal. That’s fine. If they’re ever legalized, we won’t have to have this conversation. Until then, in my mind, craigslist is an accessory to drugs, prostitution, and God only knows what else.

  • More underage prostitution on craigslist

    More underage prostitution on craigslist

    FBI investigates allegations of underage prostitution on Craigslist:

    More allegations of underage prostitution on everyone’s favorite website of scum and villainy, craigslist. Two girls out of Sacramento, California, ages 14 and 17, were found to have had ads on craigslist’s “erotic services” section.

    The affidavit describes the “erotic” ads as facilitating communication between prostitutes and clients, complete with code words calling the prostitutes “providers” and the clients “hobbyists.”

    The Sacramento site’s erotic offerings include many women posting images of their genitals and listing prices for half-hour and hour-long sessions. One ad depicts a pregnant woman, posts a phone number and offers to show callers that “pregnant women do it better.”

    The affidavit indicates that the underage girls allegedly photographed by Moore show the 14-year-old girl nude and touching herself suggestively. The 17-year-old’s ad offers various styles of sex and promises: “I will guarantee to fulfill all your naughty fantasies.”

    As usual, craigslist had a non-answer.

    The Sacramento case is the latest to focus legal scrutiny on Craigslist and prostitution ads on the highly popular Internet site. Craigslist has been linked in news accounts to prostitution stings from New York City suburbs to Chicago to Seattle. The company did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

    I wonder why? 🙄

  • Cocaine on Craigslist

    Cocaine on Craigslist

    Cops say man offered cocaine in Craigslist ad:

    Let the dumbassity commence.

    The advertisement on Craigslist New York said the man would supply cocaine to any female who responded.

    We really don’t need to go any further, but we will.

    Well, detectives from the Garden City Police Department were no doubt stunned when they found the ad. They contacted detectives from the Nassau County Police Department narcotics bureau, who had a female officer respond to the advertisement and arrange to meet the man.

    Nassau police said when Joshua W. O’Neil, 32, of Albany, met the female officer Tuesday night in Garden City, he offered her crack cocaine in exchange for “sexual favors.”

    The only “favor” O’Neil received, police said, was being placed under arrest.

    Way to go there Scarface.

  • What Craig said today

    What Craig said today

    Prostitutes Using Craigslist To Solicit For Sex:

    This is just another local news article about prostitution being advertised on craigslist. Once again, Craig himself deflects the blame.

    CBS13 went straight to the source in San Francisco to find out why you can find sex for sale, right next to an easy bake oven in Sacramento.

    Pallas: Clearly prostitution is illegal, you know prostitutes are selling sex on your website.
    Craig: There are prostitution ads on our site and people who care flag them and they do get removed but the message from our community overwhelmingly is live and let live message, people’s priorities are elsewhere.

    Craig Newmark makes it clear the user driven, open forum, free speech philosophy behind/foundation of Craigslist puts what the customer wants first and he argues very few are complaining.

    “People tell us to prioritize scammers and we’ve had very few complaints about prostitution…it’s something like one out of every one hundred thousand users or one out of a million,” says Newmark, “I want ’em off our site.”

    So why not shut it down? He sites two major reasons.

    “We wanted to draw away suspect ads from more on conventional sections like women seeking men, another is we wanted to offer legitimate erotic services to people who want them to give people a break,” says Newmark.

    Again, users flag what they suspect is illegal.

    “Right now we have overwhelming feedback from our community. They don’t want us to monitor the site, not in that way. People are happy with the flagging mechanism,” says Newmark.

    Newmark says his company won’t police the site because he might be held legally liable for what people post and he doesn’t want to get sued.

    That’s the bottom line right there. He doesn’t want to get sued. So, rather than worrying about his user base getting robbed, assaulted, or killed, he’s more worried about lining his own pocket.

    So since Craig makes money off of craigslist which provides traffickers with a place to advertise, doesn’t that make him the world’s largest pimp?

  • Another Mass. man busted on craigslist

    Another Mass. man busted on craigslist

    Man Accused Of Trying To Lure Teen For Sex:

    Another guy from Massachusetts was allegedly caught soliciting underage sex on craigslist. This time it’s married father of two, Fred Newhall III of Uxbridge. He posted an ad looking for a teenage “house cleaner”. What he ended up getting was Auburn Police Detective James Lyman posing as a 15-year-old girl.

    “He gave me a price list. If you clean, you get this. If there’s light touching, that’s how much you get. Right up to full contact being $500 a day,” Lyman said.

    Lyman said Newhall made the ultimate promise.

    “He told her if she was submissive and did everything he told her, he’d buy her a new vehicle for her birthday,” Auburn Police Chief Andrew Sluckis.

    Newhall arranged for a meeting with the girl at a house in Auburn. But when he got there, he didn’t find a 15-year-old girl; he met a police officer.

    “He had alcohol and he had some sort of massage oil. He knew what he was going to do,” Lyman said.

    Realizing the sting, Newhall allegedly pushed the police officer and ran. It took seven police officers to catch and handcuff him.

    I have no sympathy for scumbags like this. Especially ones that are supposed to be fathers.