Teen Faces 20 Years for Alleged Online Terrorist Rap Threats (UPDATED)

Cameron D'Ambrosio, an 18-year-old high school student in Methuen, Mass., has been arrested for terrorism charges because he scared people on Facebook with his rap music. Courtesy of the Valley Patriot (which does not skimp on sensationalizing the teen):

Methuen Police Chief Joe Solomon told the Valley Patriot this afternoon that D'Ambrosio a sent text message and posted terrorist threats on social media.

"We took this very seriously," Chief Solomon said.

"He posted a threat in the form of  rap where he mentioned the White House, the Boston Marathon bombing, and said 'everybody you will see what I am going to do, kill people."

Superintendent of Schools Judy Scannell said that the student was not in school today, but that a student at Methuen High School saw the posting on Facebook and notified the school administration who notified police. 

The chief goes on to explain that D'Ambrosio did not make any specific threats against any individual, but just saying he wanted to kill people was enough to arrest him and charge him with terrorism.

Oh, and there's this:

D'Ambrosio also had disturbing photos and posts on his Facebook page including "Fuck politics, Fuck Obama and Fuck the government!!"

UPDATE: The Boston Herald provides some better detail about what's going on than the Valley Patriot. D'Ambrosio faces one charge of making a bomb threat, which could could land him 20 years (but probably wouldn't). They also provide a heavily censored version of what his rap actually said:

"I'm not in reality, So when u see me (expletive) go insane and make the news, the paper, and the (expletive) federal house of horror known as the white house, Don't (expletive) cry or be worried because all YOU people (expletive) caused this (expletive)," read the social media posting that raised alarms with high school assistant Principal James Weymouth when another student called it to his attention.

The rant only got more disturbing from there as it continued, "(Expletive) a boston bominb wait till u see the (expletive) I do, I'ma be famous rapping, and beat every murder charge that comes across me!"

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Comments

[generic Brand]

D'Ambrosio also had disturbing photos and posts on his Facebook page including "Fuck politics, Fuck Obama and Fuck the government!!"

I'm D'Ambrosio? I had no idea!

[Dweebston]

We're all D'Ambrosia.

[UnCivilServant]

I don't have Facebook, so I don't have that on 'my' facebook page.

[generic Brand]

Superintendent of Schools Judy Scannell said that the student was not in school today, but that a student at Methuen High School saw the posting on Facebook and notified the school administration who notified police.

Also, this is a key step in the state's control. They train the citizens to report on and turn in their fellow citizens. That's how they ultimately control a country of 315 million with only a few million state employees.

[Almanian!]

If you see something, SAY something.

See, the terrorists DID win!

[$park?]

I don't think it's even possible to argue against that anymore.

[Almanian!]

I know - I keed, but I haz a sad, cause real life is jut suckin'. It's not even a joke any more.

"They ook 'Idiocracy', 'Brazil', '1984' and any other dystopian tome you can think of, and made it into real life!"

IT'S A COOKBOOK!!!

[UnCivilServant]

Paranoia.

"Happieness is Mandatory, Citizen. All hail Friend Computer."

[Heroic Mulatto]

I can definitely see "Libertarians" as a "secret" society in Alpha Complex.

[robc]

I think they were.

[Agammamon]

But one in which the passage of time and corruption of historical records leave the meaning of "libertarianism" distorted until the are spouting distrust of the market and private investment, the achievement ethic, and a committment ot enlarging the welfare state.

Oh wait we already have those guys IRL.

[entropy]

Snitches get stitches.

[dinkster]

racist

[Seamus]

Give that student the Pavlik Morozov Award for civic awareness and responsibility. The little shit.

[Greg]

Absolutely correct. Hell even just limiting it to schools, does anyone remember how tattletales used to be treated? I don't think my schools were unique in that regard.

[Zeb]

Shit, I had teachers who used to get annoyed when kids would tattle on each other for minor crap.

[Austrian Anarchy]

Did the kid get his songs posted to iTunes before he got busted?

[$park?]

D'Ambrosio also had disturbing photos and posts on his Facebook page including "Fuck politics, Fuck Obama and Fuck the government!!"

This is why I'm not on Facebook.

[Austrian Anarchy]

I'm on facebook, but not being in school makes it easier.

[Almanian!]

This is why I try to only have people like JD Tuccille, Lucy Steigerwald, Michael Moynihan and Michael Shanklin as "friends"....

[Fist of Etiquette]

I would report on you without a second thought.

[Almanian!]

That is why you are on my "Mortal Enemies" list, Fist.

Why do you hate Lucy? THIS is why there are no...

[Libertymike]

Moynihan is a friend?

[Cdr Lytton]

I think the word you're looking for is co-conspirators.

[Aresen]

The chief goes on to explain that D'Ambrosio did not make any specific threats against any individual, but just saying he wanted to kill people was enough to arrest him and charge him with terrorism.

Has Chief Solomon visited any of the Coptalk websites?

[WTF]

So, he's been arrested for pre-crime?

[Ptah-Hotep]

but that a student at Methuen High School saw the posting on Facebook and notified the school administration who notified police.

See something, say something.

The Stasi approves.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Today has been fucking terrifying. Between this and the confiscations going on in California, my faith in humanity is at an all time low.

[jesse.in.mb]

It certainly seems like they've gotten tired of the boil the frog slowly approach, doesn't it?

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Yeah, and I'm not sure whether to be terrified they're going all out war, or glad the mask is coming off.

I can only hope that this kind of thing will wake people up and make them realize that they ARE coming after your rights. Shit like this used to be isolated incidents of some overzealous cop/administrator/judge/etc. Now it's every other day some kid is getting suspended or expelled for thought-crimes or exercising their 1st amendment right.

The confiscations only seem to be raising eyebrows on pro-2A people as far as I can see. I actually saw someone on FB post about how great it is they're getting guns out of people's hands. It made me want to punch my screen.

[jesse.in.mb]

I only check my FB occasionally and generally know I'm going to be annoyed by what my friends are posting about politics. I'll keep in mind that today is a good day to avoid.

[Brett L]

What the fuck? Hopefully he retained a lawyer and sued the shit out of the school, the administration and the police force for violating his 1A rights.

[Austrian Anarchy]

And I hope his iTunes/YouTube songs go viral.

[$park?]

The old "You can't yell fire in a crowded theater" argument should be along in five ... four ...

[Cdr Lytton]

Also "zero tolerance for threats" "after Columbine and Newtown" "err on the side of caution" "duty to protect students" "can't take any chances" etc.

[$park?]

Patty O. Reply

May 1, 2013 at 10:33 PM

OVERREACTION?? Are you kidding me? He specifically states The Boston Marathon and killing lots of people.Get your head out of the sand.When these kids want to do adult things that are illegal there is a price to pay and ALL MENTIONS OF TERRORIST ACTIVITY SHOULD AND MUST BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY!!!!

[jesse.in.mb]

Remind me not to make jokes about bitches blowin' up my phone around Patty O.

[generic Brand]

The "joke" party is because only dudes blow up jesse's phone.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Dudes can be bitches. Have you ever met any gay men?

[jesse.in.mb]

You are both factually correct.

*throws confetti in the air*

Mazel tov!

[dinkster]

Mazel tov cocktails are terrorist bombs!

[Almanian!]

Jesus FUCKING Christ

*offs self*

[Zeb]

Even supposing that all mentions of terrorist activity should be taken seriously, that doesn't mean that they can or should be criminalized.

[Old Man With Candy]

Magic words: qualified immunity.

[JW]

It's been revoked!

[sarcasmic]

Thoughtcrime is death.

[tarran]

Ah yes, Methuen. If Lawrence is the asshole of MA, then Methuen is the taint.

This twerp is basically a MA version of a yob. And the school officials are members of the spineless parasitic species that infest the local education blob.

[$park?]

MA would be a great place if everything east of 395 sunk into the ocean never to be heard from again.

[thom]

This kid if going to be awesome when he hits his twenties with a few million $ in settlement money.

[Rasilio]

" If Lawrence is the asshole of MA"

Wait, you mean there was any question as to whether this was true?

[Heroic Mulatto]

Wait, you mean there was any question as to whether this was true?

Yes, Somerville.

[Ska]

What does Springfield count as? Armpit?

[$park?]

That sounds about right. It does smell pretty bad over here.

[Rasilio]

Who cares, It's Westa Woosta so it's not like it's really part of the state

[$park?]

If only...

[deified]

You shut your whore mouth. Somerville is the tits!

Now, Billerica....billerica is a pit.

[Rasilio]

Nah Somerville is a horrible place to live but at least it has some worthwhile places to visit, the only reason to go to Lawrence is to buy drugs or a $50 hooker.

Now if you said Brockton you might have has an argument.

[Libertymike]

How about Fall River?

[Auric Demonocles]

Hey! Somerville is pretty great. Except for the hipsters. And slumbrew.

[Ted S.]

If Lawrence is the asshole of MA,

Massachusetts already has an Athol.

[Zeb]

If they'd put any thought into it, they would have made Athol the asshole and Belchertown the mouth.

[Almanian!]

I hope this kid is able to post another rap song about what he's going to do to the motherfucking snitch bitch who turned him in, yo.

[$park?]

Cunt punts all around.

[Almanian!]

"cunt punt" - best term EVAR

[Ayn Random Variation]

The Geto Boys better get out of Dodge:

http://www.sing365.com/music/l.....25002B3DC6

[Heroic Mulatto]

He should be facing 20 years for the murder of hip hop.

[deified]

Ja Rule would like to have a word with you.

[Almanian!]

FUCK tha poe lease comin' straight from the underground
A young nigger's got it bad cause he's brown....

Guess Ice Cube et al got Hollywood before all the cop killin' gangsta rap became TEH TERRRIZZMZZSS!!!11!

[$park?]

ERMAHGERD! TERRERERSTS!

[Kaptious Kristen]

I just put some Bodycount on my Grooveshark playlist....someone report me and Ice T immediately!

(BTW, the Bodycount is why I refuse to join the NRA)

[deified]

Don't join the NRA; join Ice-T.

[Zeb]

Nice.

[Brandon]

Fuck politics, Fuck Obama and Fuck the government. No need to get that excited about it.

[$park?]

It's a shame Brandon won't be around anymore, seemed like a nice guy. Quite type, mostly kept to himself.

[RBS]

I heard they found libertarian websites in his browser history.

[Fatty Bolger]

Guilty! ... of offending white sensibilities.

[bostonaod]

I couldn't decide which of these were most vomit-inducing, I leave it to you:

"Once again we have to commend the Methuen High School Student who came forward, we always say, if you see something, say something, and that's what this student did. We also want to commend the school safety officers and the administration for bringing this to our attention immediately. Threats of this kind of violence is unacceptable and will not be tolerated, not in Methuen they won't."

Commendations all 'round! That will make this less likely in the future!

"We got the tip around 1pm and by 1:30 we had him in custody," the chief said bragged.

Way to go chief! Bet you didn't even stop to consider whether any crime had been committed.

[JW]

"And we carried out the execution by 2:00..."

[Pro Libertate]

I know there's not much point in saying this, but established law is pretty clear that the speaker has to be inciting imminent violence or other lawless action for the state to be able to do anything. I mean, they could go get warrants and do other stuff to watch the guy if the speech makes them suspicious about an underlying crime, but I don't see how they can legally charge him with anything just for the statements. There has to be more.

[$park?]

Get outta here with yer fancy pants lawyer talk.

[bostonaod]

"I do want to make clear he did not make a specific threat against the school or any particular individuals but he did threaten to kill a bunch of people and specifically mentioned the Boston Marathon and the White House. The threat was disturbing enough for us to act and I think our officers did the right thing."

FYTW

[Pro Libertate]

Like I said, is that enough to suspect him of being potentially dangerous? Maybe. The standard for getting warrants to do surveillance, etc. is a different matter.

But arresting him on completely legal speech? Should be illegal. We'll see.

[Zeb]

Not to mention that it is lyrics to a song. No matter what they say, it should be protected absolutely under the 1st amendment. Presenting art is not the same as just saying something. It's pretty common for people to write songs that say things that are exaggerated or not even representative of what they would say for themselves at all.

[Pro Libertate]

That strikes close to home. I've posted over thirty song parodies (of varying quality) at Urkobold. Just looking at the first one, I have, by this logic, apparently advocated the sterilization of people who commit error.

For the record, I advocate no such thing. I'm a peaceful, suburban-dweller.

[Tonio]

Dude, that document is like 100 years old and stuff. It's not like we wear powdered wigs anymore...

[Pro Libertate]

A fair point. Freedom is for people who actually are willing to fight for it.

[CatoTheElder]

9/11 changed everything.
Sandy Hook changed everything again.

Your old parchment Constitution is a dead letter, and your old SC rulings are subject to change. Hope and Change as the nation moves Forward!

[Enough About Palin]

Fuck his dumb ass.

[Killazontherun]

When they came for the dumbasses . . .

[Zeb]

What did he do? I'm pretty sure that all first amendment precedent pretty absolutely protects the content of song lyrics.

[Old Man With Candy]

Indictment and essential personal destruction =/= conviction. Probably can't get the latter, but they can easily accomplish the former.

[Old Man With Candy]

"Teen Faces 20 Years for Alleged Online Rap"

IMO, that should be enough for indefinite detention. rap is the pimple on the ass of crappy pop music, all white-headed and ready to pop.

[Zeb]

Old fart.^^

[Old Man With Candy]

Well, yes, but an old fart with good taste in music. When rap got going, I was a much younger fart. Even knew the founders.

It sucks. Worse than mayo, even. I don't believe in censorship, but calling it "music" and the so-called performers "artists" is fraud, straight up.

[Tonio]

Dude, those damn kids are on your lawn again. Better go chase 'em off.

[Zeb]

Well, to each his own. Though it puzzles me how one can come to so easily categorize the entire range of music where the vocalist primarily speaks rather than singing based simply on that single characteristic.

[Old Man With Candy]

You make a categorical error by classifying it as "music."

[Old Man With Candy]

Actually, you described Richard Harris droning, "Someone left a cake out in the rain..." which had equal suckitude. Ditto the idiotic "Convoy."

[Ted S.]

D'Ambrosio also had disturbing photos and posts on his Facebook page including "Fuck politics, Fuck Obama and Fuck the government!!"

Fucking Michelle Obama is indeed disturbing.

[Tonio]

I see what you did there, Theodore.

[Scott S.]

Updated with some clearer information from the Boston Herald.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Still nothing there to warrant an arrest. As Pro Libertate said, maybe some surveillance or an investigation, but outright arresting him 30 minutes after he was reported is beyond fucked up.

[$park?]

Sounds like the kid is getting a bad rap.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

All of it is bad. Except Dre, he be the realest.

[Nikki makes the sign of a tsp]

The rant only got more disturbing from there as it continued, "(Expletive) a boston bominb wait till u see the (expletive) I do, I'ma be famous rapping, and beat every murder charge that comes across me!"

So, isn't that really saying that his rap game is going to be more "impressive" than the Boston bombing? And possibly that he'll be charged with murder, but it doesn't sound like he's threatening to commit one.

[Zeb]

And even if it did sound that way, it is a lyric to a song, not a statement of intent, and pretty clearly protected under the 1st amendment.

[Dunphy (the real one)]

Except I can tell you the devil is in the details. The article doesn't say. When he sent the rap as a text message how did he frame it? "Hey, this is a cool thing I wrote. Check it out?"

or "This is what's going down!"

etc.

We sit here and wank and make definitive statements from a huge position of ignorance and again as somebody who has been involved in very detailed witness intimidation and threats cases - it REALLY is about the totality of the circs and there is no way to know based on this article the critical case facts surrounding how the rap was presented, which are enormously relevant to the true threat standard being met or not.

[cavalier973]

The net is closing in....

[Dunphy (the real one)]

Here's a decent site imo for "true threats" which is the standard under which this stuff is judged.

http://www.firstamendmentschoo.....x?id=12996

I've had a # of cases involving same, including a very long and detailed one involving witness intimidation. It's a complex, nuanced, and interesting area of the law.

My prediction in this case. Iow, my wild ass guess? After the thing blows over he gets some cheesy plea bargain and probation.

In my case, the guy got 4 yrs, but then he threatened to use a hitman and with very detailed planning to kill the witness that had put him in prison. I interrogated him 4 times iirc both with and without miranda (not required in interrogation in certain instances).

Whether one thinks it's "good or not"...

--"I'm not in reality, So when u see me (expletive) go insane and make the news, the paper, and the (expletive) federal house of horror known as the white house, Don't (expletive) cry or be worried because all YOU people (expletive) caused this (expletive)," read the social media posting that raised alarms with high school assistant Principal James Weymouth when another student called it to his attention.

The rant only got more disturbing from there as it continued, "(Expletive) a boston bominb wait till u see the (expletive) I do, I'ma be famous rapping, and beat every murder charge that comes across me!"--

Sounds like it would probably meet the true threat standard based on case law.

[Dunphy (the real one)]

oh also, threats cases are one of the few cases where past acts can be used against the perp.

If the recipient of the threat knows of violent past acts by the threatener (and while the article doesn't mention same for privacy reasons, there may or may not be past history of violent acts), that substantially ups the validity of the threat as a "true threat".

[dinkster]

Threats in my opinion are only meaningful if they are made with the intent of coercion. For instance, I just got threatened by a drunk bum while I was skateboarding back to work from lunch. He wanted to beat the crap out of me for skating too close to him. Of course, as he lacked the ability to do anything to me, the coercion didn't actually exist, so I laughed my ass off instead. Could I have gotten him arrested? Probably. But then again, I'm not an irrational pussy.

[JeremyR]

So I guess John Deacon of Queen better never come back to the US, for writing the song "Another One Bites the Dust"

About the only difference I see between that and this is that he mentioned the White House. But I've heard other musicians make similar comments. Not to mention people like that Craig Kilborn putting a Snipers Wanted sign over a picture of GWB.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

How about pretty much every hardcore rapper out there. They constantly threaten anyone and everyone. Often with specific references to people or neighborhoods as targets.

Dunphy, I tried to give you the benefit of the doubt. I don't have the unrelenting cop hatred that is prevalent here, but...

Fuck off, slaver.

[dinkster]

I do. FTP

[ant1sthenes]

From the passage above, he isn't saying anything that could literally be interpreted as a direct threat. He's saying he'll be talked about, and he'll do some unnamed but impressively horrible thing (with no stated target), which will result in murder charges. Shit, it's probably tamer than a lot of rap.

I mean, maybe he's a psycho planning a school shooting or mixing random chemicals in a bottle or whatever, but that means you keep an eye on him and snoop around within the bounds of the law to see if there are any further red flags. Being flagrantly suspicious isn't and shouldn't be criminal.