Woman whose name was linked to racist messages tells police they are fake
A woman whose name was linked to racist social media posts told police the messages were faked.
Lexington police are investigating whether the woman’s social media account was hacked or if the images shared online were fabricated. She came under fire after the images were shared online.
According to an incident report, the woman told police she was alerted by friends to the racist messages that seemed to be sent from her account.
“When she checked online, the complainant states that she found no messages in her Facebook messenger account and nothing on her Facebook profile resembling the screen shots she was shown,” the report says. “It appeared to her that someone had taken her name and profile picture to create another page and write these messages.”
The racist messages appeared to be posted on a social media account attributed to a woman described as a Lexington nurse. Images of the messages were widely shared online in recent days and drew comments from two health care providers in Lexington County.
Carolina Gardens Senior Living, an assisted living facility in West Columbia, said it was investigating “hurtful and vulgar” social media posts linked to one of its employees. Meanwhile, Lexington Medical Center felt compelled to respond to comments on its own Facebook page saying the woman whose named was connected to the posts did not work for the hospital.
Cpl. Cameron Mortenson with the Lexington Police Department said investigators are trying to determine if any laws have been broken, and how the department can proceed if they have.
“We’re looking to see if these were authentic messages, or if they were done to discredit her,” Mortenson said. It’s possible the messages shared online were created separately and then had the woman’s name and photo attached to them by the creator, and were never actually shared from a social media account at all, he said.
“She says she didn’t send them, and she had no idea about any of this until her friends reached out to her like, ‘did you do this?’” Mortenson said.
Mortenson said it would take time for investigators to determine how the images shared online were created, and what account if any they were shared from, when and where. Investigators will also need cooperation from Facebook to determine their veracity, he said.
“These investigations always take time,” he said. “And we’re in an environment now where things are moving very fast.”
This story was originally published June 12, 2020 at 6:04 PM.
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