Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Beth Bentley - what possibility?

Shortly after Beth Bentley went missing, somebody entered her personal Facebook account and began deleting comments, messages and photographs. Since Beth had been reported missing on May 24, 2010, to the Woodstock (Ill.) Police Department, it probably wasn't Beth who was purging her account.

So, just who was it who entered her account?

Could it be considered illegal for one person (or maybe more?) to enter a personal Facebook account of someone else, especially a missing person, and without authorization delete comments and photographs? Or would this person claim that Beth had told her (or him), "If anything happens to me, get into my Facebook account and get rid of a lot of stuff."

If the police didn't get a chance to make screen shots of every page in Beth's account before those deletions were made and to make a list of all the Friends, is there any possibility that the person doing the removing could be charged with Obstruction of Justice? Do you have to first know that a crime was committed, before an Obstruction charge will stick?

How extensively did the Woodstock Police Department search Beth's Facebook page for information and clues, before the details and names began to disappear?

Many of the "Friends" of Beth who were in her Friends list used their own names. And those "friends" now? Gone. Now, of course, some of them might have "unfriended" Beth. Why would they do that? Why would they run and hide, as the investigation lingered without any substantial progress?

Fortunately, screen shots of those pages do exist. It's just not know if the police have them.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Well, I'm not totally sure, but from my understanding, virtually "nothing" is every totally erased from the internet; so I would think if officials really wanted Facebook info, they'd be able to get it directly from the Facebook servers. I think...
And as far as "erasing" is concerned, I, myself, am excellent at "erasing" the golden liquid from inside 40oz beer bottles! DOH!