Over the weekend a story started surfacing about an Instagram account that was exposing witnesses in criminal cases in Philadelphia. The account called “rats215” exposed affidavits and photos of victims and complainants in criminal cases.
“There was a lot of information there … a lot of information that was not for public viewing,” Philadelphia Police Spokeswoman Tonya Little said Wednesday.
The Instagram account exposed more than 30 witnesses since February and shared over 150 pictures pertaining to criminal cases in the city of brotherly love since it’s inception. The account had over 7900 followers who actively commented on each photo.
Police have traced the account back to a 17 year old boy in Philadelphia who now faces charges of witness intimidation, and terroristic threats
Yahoo News reports that the investigation began on October 24th and is still on-going. Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams is looking to charge the 17 year old as an adult. “The actions of this teenager could have lasting repercussions on untold cases here in Philadelphia,” Williams said in a statement.
“I don’t care how old you are, if you intimidate a witness in this city I’m going to come after you,” he added.
Now that they’ve tracked the Instagram account back to the teenager the next hurdle is finding out how he had access to this information and who else, if anyone, he was working with.
