MySpace mugging: not just kids at risk

Wild web gets wilder

By Lucy Sherriff • Get more from this author

Posted in Music and Media, 29th June 2006 11:33 GMT

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It seems that it isn't just teenage girls who are in danger on MySpace. A 22-year-old Florida man has been held up at gunpoint after going to meet an 18-year-old he made contact with on the MySpace network.

According to reports, Ernest Evans had arranged a date with a woman calling herself Natalia after the two had been chatting online. Natalia claimed she was 18, and said in her profile that she was "Lookin' for something fun". However, Natalia is said to have been a fictional persona invented by a pair of teenaged girls, 13-year-old Rafaella Yusupova and 14-year-old Yana Galilova.

When he arrived at their agreed rendezvous, Evans told police, the two girls approached him and asked to borrow his phone. Once he had handed it over to one of the girls, the other held a loaded gun to his head and demanded his wallet and money.

The two girls have been arrested and charged with armed robbery and carrying a concealed weapon. A 21-year-old man who was with them when they were arrested has also been taken into custody and charged with furnishing minors with firearms.

The moral of this story is the same as ever. If you meet someone online and you want to meet up in real life, do so in a public place, preferably not alone. This story just underlines that the rule applies to everyone, not just 14-year-old girls. ®

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