I need advice please - what the fuck do I do about this?

[forfuckssake23]

I received a message on FB messenger from a 16 year old boy who claims to be a friend of my DD (also 16). They live in opposite ends of the country and have never met but have been messaging and FaceTiming and according to DD became "friends" over FaceTime.

He has messaged me directly saying "do you know what bad things your daughter has been doing?"

I asked him what and he alleges that she had accused an ex boyfriend of "trying to rape her". This sounds not remotely like my daughter at all, so I spoke to her straight away and she was tearful saying "he's pissed off with me because I didn't message him all day, he's trying to get me in trouble". Apparently he has messaged her ex boyfriend to tell him that my DD has falsely accused him of trying to rape her. My DD looked me in the face and swore to me on her baby sister's life that she has done nothing of the sort and he is just trying to stir up trouble for her because she didn't message him today and they had an argument about this. I believe her.

This kid is however continuing to message me things like "so what are you going to do about it then?" etc.

How the fuck do I handle this? I mean obviously I could just block him but I am SO angry that he is invented this story about my daughter.

I don't do likes.

If by 'likes' you mean things like cafes, shops, small businesses, etc. Rather than someone's posts.

For the reasons you state. Too much information available for anyone to see.

someone mentioned that the police might pay him a visit.
Not sure how. It depends what he's revealed about himself.
If he has a school and DD knows it, fine, but if he's mainly anon other than for his name, not sure.

I’m wondering whether it’s worth trying to report him on Facebook or something because if he’s done this to your DD he might be doing it to others!

There is a really good podcast about a boy who behaves like this, but takes it to an extreme, called Can I tell you a secret.

It might be worth listening to it with DD, so she gets proper privacy controls in place and learns a little bit more about boundaries and judgement on line. These are things we learnt so gradually, that we don't think to teach them, but it can get so out of control so fast with just one little on line arsehole troll.

I think your biggest issue is your daughter 'met' another child online and got to the point of facetiming them. This is why this is not advisable to do. I hope she is OK and learns from this not to trust strangers over the internet. I personally would be reporting to the police as goodness knows who else he will do this to and they might not have a supportive mum like your DD has. They might not reach out and trust someone to help them.

Thanks that's helpful, will give it a listen with DD.

Absolutely.

The messages demanding to know how I plan to "deal with it" were particularly creepy. Fucking weirdo.

OP by blocking him your DD is right, she now can't see the messages, but I think you can get the whole chat history sent to you (or rather her) as an email

support.snapchat.com/en-GB/a/download-my-data

If a teen messaged me and said they thought my son or daughter had been involved in a sexual assault or was making false allegations - I would first want evidence. I would first off thank them for telling me as if that happened, we will take it very seriously and to please send me screenshots of the messages.

Given the seriousness of the issue, I would't just block and delete messages. Same as if they said my teen was talking about suicide or some other serious issue. If the teen on the other end sent me any proof, I would take it to the police.

@musingsinmidlife

This is precisely why I didn't just block him as others have asked me.

There's no text evidence of the conversation unfortunately- he alleges it happened on a FaceTime call.

Very helpful, thank you.

That's a useful thing to know. Thank you.

Is your DD still in contact with the ex boyfriend that the allegations are being made about? Did this teen actually contact him to say your DD is saying he raped her? I would be worried about that kid if this teen has told him that as he may think your DD is actually making these allegations. Kids have killed themselves over things like this and being falsely accused of rape is a big one.

I would reach out to ex boyfriend parents or to police to follow up with ex boyfriend to be sure he knows there is no proof of these allegations and your DD denies making them.

@musingsinmidlife

She is still in contact with the ex boyfriend yes, they are in the same year at school. They don't have a lot of contact but they are civil as far as I know.

Yes, the boy messaged me saying "are you aware she is accusing (ex's name) of threatening to rape her?" and "I've messaged (ex's name) about this, he is saying it's a load of bullshit". That's what his messages said.

DD's version is he's annoyed at her for not replying to his messages for a day and is trying to get her into trouble, and swears to me she has said no such thing about her ex boyfriend.

I haven't spoken directly to ex boyfriend so no idea what his take on it is, nor do I know if ex boyfriend has contacted DD about it. I'll double check that tonight.

My worry is (and this has just popped into my head): what if the ex boyfriend did threaten this? What if DD did confide in her online "friend" about this? What if the ex boyfriend is saying he did no such thing, when he did? And what if my DD is too scared to tell me he actually did?

Does that make sense?

I feel the police need to speak to both boys?

Because if ex boyfriend really did make those threats, he needs dealing with by the police. But if he didn't, he's an innocent party in all this? My head is all over tbh.

I agree, it could be nothing but it could be serious. I would probably talk to the police and get their advice on how best to proceed. If the teen is just mad at your DD, he could use a good talking to about making false allegations and accusing specifc people. If your DD did disclose and there was something said, then that needs to be followed up on too.

I heard something like this happened in Fareham.

If any of this is true then these teenage boys are going to be toxic men. 16 is late to get a personality transplant.

Your daughter needs to think carefully about her male friends overall.

You should step back OP and do nothing else.

You will never know the truth.

All you need to do now is educate your DD about not getting into online chats with anyone she doesn't know, and also giving away too much information.

She needs advice on how to keep herself safe online and change her privacy settings.

I doubt the police would intervene here as it's just really unpleasant chat between some 16 yr olds.

Your DD should block the ex and refuse to engage in any more discussion over it.

I think this is 100% wrong.

This probably innocent ex is going to have himself and his family interviewed potentially by the police for threatening rape? All on the grounds of malicious online chat?

Nope.

Ridiculous idea.

I usually don't need to micromanage her phone usage, she's very open with me.

You needed to after this incident though, & it's unfortunate you didn't listen to the advice to treat her like a child for one evening & remove her devices from her, or you would have still had the evidence to take to the police.
I've spoken to DD again this morning before she left for school. She's saying she only chatted to him on Snapchat and now she's blocked him all messages have automatically been erased as apparently that's what happens when you block someone on Snapchat? I wouldn't know, I've never used it. So there's no evidence of the messages between them. All other contact was FaceTime calls.

I have no idea what is recoverable on snapchat. The police will know, but they are less likely to be motivated to investigate now you can no longer provide immediate evidence of the threat this person presented to DD.

Please don't let that stop you from chasing it up with them though, & insisting on investigation. You have NO IDEA who this geezer is, where he lives, or if he's even the same person DD interacted with onscreen.
He could be the ex boyfriend in question, or a mate of his. As PP said, he could be someone who already knows DD, or some random who lives locally. Or an accomplished adult abuser & entrapper.

I hope you & DD got enough sleep last night, & she is feeling safer.
Good luck chasing this up with he police.

Someone is passing around messages that this teen is an alleged rapist.

Unfortunately the ship has already sailed for this innocent teen. His name is out there as an alleged rapist.

This is one of the things I'm finding hardest to understand.
Also why I suspect that the guy may be closer connected to DD than she knows, or may not be in Scotland at all.
Or that she has been far more intense with him than her mum actually knows, & has been groomed to spill all kinds of personal info & secrets.
Even that maybe her ex-b/f actually DID sexually accost her.

All horribly uncomfortable & distressing things to consider.

Sometimes we long to fully trust our teen DD's maturity & developing street smarts. Sometimes we have to put that longing away, forget about the personal affront to their dignity, & order them about.
Removing DD's phone last night for example - rather than trusting her to know that the best thing to do was to NOT block the guy & have his message trail disappear.

DD will be feeling a miasma of conflicting & confusing emotions right now. One of them may well be (it is for many victims) a guilty sense of complicity. The only way past that is trust & transparency. Until OP is able to have a more searching conversation with her, & get to the bottom of how on earth this random "from Scotland" was able to leverage or invent a personal horror story about her scary enough for her to be manipulated with.

OP - how do you think this guy found you on facebook? Are you linked to DD's account as 'friend' or named as 'relation'?

I've woken up with a renewed anger and he isn't getting away with doing this to my baby, whoever he is.

That's the spirit OP.

I know you mean well, but I think you are way off reality with your advice.

It's perfectly obvious how the boy might know who is her ex boyfriend. Either he has seen photos and posts on FB between them, or she has told him who she was dating. If he has found HER on Fbook then he can see her newsfeed I imagine. Likewise her mum- photos named, or as a friend with the same surname, and he took a punt it was her mum.

The police are not even getting rapists to court at the moment. In the papers today that one 1 :30 ends up in court for sexual offences.

Are you being serious that you think they would pursue online allegations of something that supposedly was threatened but didn't happen?

Sorry but you don't even seem to know how social media works and the 'paper trail' to finding who's related to who, or a friend.