Rebekah Jones' son charged under law making online threats - even 'jokes' or 'memes' - a crime
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The Florida law that led to the arrest of a Navarre teen who deputies say threatened to “shoot up” a school on social media doesn’t consider whether the threat was actually carried out. Putting threats in writing where people can see them is enough to warrant arrest.
The 13-year-old son of former congressional candidate and state data scientist Rebekah Jones was arrested by the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office last week and charged with making written, electronic threat of a mass shooting/terrorism act. Deputies say the boy made multiple threats about shooting and killing people at Holley Navarre Middle School on different social media sites and that a number of other teens saw and received the messages from his account.
According to deputies, the teen had been a student at the school, but had recently left and was homeschooled at the time of the alleged threats.
The arrest: Rebekah Jones' son arrested in Florida after allegedly threatening to shoot up school, stab students
An incident report alleges that the 13-year-old made repeated threats to shoot up Holley Navarre Middle School and to stab students who angered him.
In the messages to his friends, according to the report, the teenager made the following statements, among others:
“I want to shoot up the school.”
"If I get a gun I’m gonna shoot up hnms lol.”
“I’m getting a wrath and natural selection shirt so maybe but I don’t think many ppl know what the columbine shooters look like.”
“Okay so it’s been like 3-4 weeks since I got on my new antidepressants and they aren’t working but they’re suppose to by now so I have no hope in getting better so why not kill the losers at school.”
The teenager told one of his friends that he planned to shoot up the school the Thursday before Spring Break but there were too many things going on so he postponed it until March 31.
The students reported the claims to the school prior to that date and the investigation was launched.
Investigators also found several memes depicting violence.
“I spoke to students from HNMS and was able to obtain screenshots of (the teen's) Snapchat post containing threats,” an investigator wrote in the boy’s warrant report. "... The screen shots were a meme that shows a brain, with the brain saying, ‘reach for the officer’s gun,’ and underneath was a caption which said, ‘me every time I see school security.’
“The second one shows an individual with a shaved head holding a HI-C drink, the message on this meme was, ‘I’m feeling so silly I might shoot up a building full of people,’ next to the message was several emojis, with several of them being smiling emojis,” the report continued.
In the report, deputies say they also asked the boy if he intended to carry out these threats and he said, “No.”
Under Florida statute 836.10, simply writing threats online where others can see them is enough to make an arrest. Deputy Chief Assistant State Attorney in Santa Rosa County, Mark Alderman, has prosecuted several cases under the statute. He said it doesn’t matter if the person making the threat intends to carry it out or not.
“You don’t have to wait until the person is on campus with a gun,” said Alderman. “If somebody is writing about it on Facebook, ‘I’m going to shoot up the school’ or making comments like that, at that point we can do a warrant under that statute.”
Alderman said crimes involving written, electronic threats are becoming more common. In September of 2020, a then 23-year-old Pace man was arrested under the same statute for making numerous school shooting threats to the University of West Florida via an online game chat.
His statements included that he would be “the best school shooter,” and would “just have to get 34 kills to be a legend,” based his research of the most people killed during a shooting.
The suspect, Shane Davis, pleaded no contest to the charges and last May agreed to probation and a pre-trial release agreement with a long list of conditions he needed to meet for a year to avoid incarceration including, staying away from UWF, wearing a GPS monitor, and completing a mental health evaluation and any recommended treatment.
Alderman said when deciding sentencing, courts can take into account the individual’s intent and prior record, and in the cases of juvenile suspect’s, their age. However, it doesn’t matter if the threat was a prank or meant to be menacing. Alderman says it’s similar to making a bomb threat, which falls under a different statute, but is considered a crime.
In February, Santa Rosa Sheriff’s investigators charged a New Jersey teen as an adult for making multiple local swatting calls, an all-too-common practice of making prank calls to emergency services so they’ll dispatch armed police officers to a particular address. Brad Parga, 17, faces one felony count of making a false report of using firearms in a violent manner and one misdemeanor count of interfering with school administration functions.
Another case: Swatting calls to Milton High School net New Jersey teen a felony charge
Deputies say he made multiple, fake active shooter calls to Milton High School between February and April 2022. Parga has pleaded not guilty to the charges and is scheduled to appear in Santa Rosa County Court on May 9.
“There was no intent to carry it out,” said Alderman, “it’s just to create panic and fear in the school and some people they think that’s funny I guess.”
With so many real mass shootings and acts of violence happening across the country, Alderman said they don’t wait to see if someone making threats is serious. They encourage children and adults who see or hear threats or acts of violence to report it.
Crime Stoppers takes tips anonymously, and in the case of Rebekah Jones’ son, one of the deputies encouraged a student who was interviewed for the investigation to download the P3 Tips app, which allows people to submit secure and anonymous tips to Crime Stoppers programs and law enforcement agencies.
Rebekah Jones said her son is being targeted because she blew the whistle on state government corruption and that someone claiming to be a cousin of one of her son’s classmates joined their private Snapchat group. She says the person recorded the conversations and reported them to the police after her son shared a popular internet meme criticizing police.
Alderman said the boy has not yet been charged by the State Attorney’s Office, but he expects the teen will be soon.
“The crime is the written threat,” said Alderman. “People can say, ‘I was joking, I didn’t mean it,’ but the crime is the written threat, which to me, if you keep repeating it then at what point does it become more than a joke versus something you’re probably thinking about. My position is I’m not going to wait until something happens. If somebody is making these comments and writing these comments, then we’re probably going to have to step in.”
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Rebekah Jones' son charged in Florida under law making threats a crime
