Furious Callers Harass Wrong Family In Cheerleader Beating Case
Pictured:The puke punks.
Just unplug the freakin’ phone…sheesh!
Not cool, though. Watch the original beating video here.
LAKELAND, Fla. — A Central Florida family is being hounded by hundreds of angry callers… who mistakenly think they’re connected to the notorious videotaped beating of a teen girl described by the sheriff as “animalistic.”
Darlene and Jerry Ashley’s phone number was mistakenly posted by a user of the YouTube video-sharing Web site, along with the numbers of the other teens charged in the beating.
Callers think the Lakeland couple are the parents of one of the teen boys involved who has the same last name.
The couple said they got around 300 angry, abusive calls from all over the country Wednesday.
Meanwhile, a circuit judge issued a gag order in the case.
Judge J. Michael McCarthy granted the request filed in a motion by Rusty Franklin, who is representing Zachary Ashley, 17, one of two boys accused of being a lookout for the girls during the alleged attack on Victoria Lindsay, a Mulberry High School cheerleader.
The judge’s order restricts lawyers, court personnel, law enforcement and witnesses from releasing information about the case.
The motion said the Polk County Sheriff’s Office released a “barrage of inflammatory, prejudicial information” about the case and said that disclosures to the media have created a “substantial likelihood” that Ashley cannot receive a fair trial.
“Some parents were remorseful. The kids really were not. They were laughing and joking about, (saying), ‘I guess we won’t get to go to the beach during spring break.’ And one, as you said, asked whether she could go to cheerleading practice,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said.
The beating was in retaliation for the victim saying disparaging things about the girls on her MySpace page, deputies said. The girls planned on posting the video of the beating on YouTube and MySpace, deputies said.
Lindsay is still recovering from her injuries.
The six girls accused in the attack and Ashley are in juvenile detention. The other alleged lookout, an 18-year-old man, is free on bail.
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I understand the public’s infatuation with immediate satisfaction by way of videos and audio of actual events. We always need to SEE or HEAR what actually happened. But seeing videos such as these being distributed throughout the internet and potentially causing numerous people to commit crimes themselves as a result is really disappointing. Again, I understand that this societal need to know and experience will never go away and that it is an inherent aspect of humanity however people should think sometimes before making some types of material widely available. Thanks.