Did he do it?

In a recent news story that has been all over TV and the Internet, Phillip Markoff allegedly set up appointments on Craigslist with two women who were then attacked by him. One women died. There could be other victims, they are still investigating. 

I think this is a serious case and I think I can definitely relate this to my theme of enabling or suppressing your identity within new media. I have not talked much about Craigslist on my blogs but I think it is a type of new media and social networking site that sometimes gets overlooked because of all the hype of Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc. 

This type of site allows you to search for services, jobs, houses, and post ones that you are willing to sell or advertise as well. Many probably did not know there was a section titled “eroitc” on there though. I feel like that is just asking for trouble, but anyways the results from this service has left one woman dead and who knows what else has happened to others. 

I think this man who is luring these women into his hotel rooms etc, has obviously suppressed his identity to his fiance, neighbor, and family (if this is true) and let another side of him be enabled on the Internet. KSL reported on this story and here are a few quotes from people talking about the alleged murderer:

"He could not hurt a fly," Megan McAllister said in an e-mail to ABC's "Good Morning America. "All I have to say is Philip is a beautiful person, inside and out," she said in the e-mail read on Tuesday's program.

"He was smart, he carried himself well, he was clean, a good looking guy," said Bernard, a retired electric company worker. "He seemed like the type that would have it all. It doesn't make sense."

Those quotes do not sound like someone that would commit this type of crime so obviously he is hiding part of his identity, and then felt that he could show a different side of him on the Internet, which in turn got him into some serious trouble.

Another thing that I thought was interesting in this case was that the investigators were trying to reach his fiances family through Facebook! That shows you how valuable this new social networking site has become, that police are using it to find people!!!! I think that is crazy because you don’t really know if the person who they say they are on Facebook is really who they are. They could receive false information or be wasting their time thinking they have the right person. 

So I think this story teaches us a lesson that most of us probably know. You cannot automatically trust who you meet online. You have to be careful when meeting people you have contacted on the Internet, and especially that people who say they are one minute could be a different one the next minute. Don’t you agree?