Wisconsin Residents File Lawsuit Against Facebook in Regards to Kenosha Shooting
Friday, September 25th, 2020 -- 11:04 AM
(AP) -Facebook can’t be trusted to enforce its ban on violent rhetoric in the run-up to the November elections, as is evident by its refusal to remove a group’s call to arms to protect businesses in Kenosha last month before a night of unrest in which two protesters were shot and killed, according to a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday.The lawsuit filed by the partner of one of the slain men, two protesters and a journalist warns that militias will continue to use Facebook to incite violence if the President loses the Nov. 3 election but refuses to leave office. The suit seeks a court order that would force the social media giant to remove posts calling for violence as well as posts by militia groups and hate groups. It also seeks unspecified damages for the plaintiffs, who say they were traumatized by their interactions with the armed men who turned up at the protests over the Aug. 23 shooting of a Black man, Jacob Blake, by a white Kenosha police officer. The officer shot Blake seven times in the back, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down. Cellphone video of the shooting sparked several nights of protests and unrest, leading the governor to call in the National Guard. “Facebook’s inaction led to the death of two protesters, in addition to the harm suffered by Plaintiffs,” the lawsuit states. “The enabling and empowering of militias to conspire with its platform and tools allows white supremacist groups to recruit, organize, and thrive, while Facebook continues to profit from their activities, and those who fight for social justice continue to die.” According to the lawsuit, a militia group calling itself the Kenosha Guard put out a call on its Facebook page for armed people to guard property in the city, which sits along Lake Michigan between Milwaukee and Chicago. Among those who took up the call was Rittenhouse, according to the suit. “Armed and ready. Shoot to kill tonight,” a respondent commented on the post. “Ditto!” replied another. The plaintiffs, citing a Buzzfeed story, argue that Facebook received more than 400 complaints about the post but that the company’s content moderators conducted several reviews and decided the post didn’t violate Facebook’s anti-violence policies. The Kenosha Guard removed its post the day after the shootings and Facebook took down the militia group’s entire page later that day, Buzzfeed reported.
The plaintiffs include Hannah Gittings, who describes herself as Huber’s life partner. She said she watched Huber die and suffered threats and insults from members of the Kenosha Guard and the Boogaloo Bois, an anti-government extremist group. Some of them pointed their guns at her, the lawsuit alleges. Another plaintiff, Christopher McNeal, is Black and was confronted, commanded, assaulted and harassed by militia, according to the lawsuit. A third plaintiff, a Black woman named Carmen Palmer, says she traveled to the protest with her children and that militia members threatened her, sprayed her with pepper spray and slashed her group’s tires. The fourth plaintiff is Nathan Peet, a freelance journalist who says he tried to help Rosenbaum after he was shot but that his efforts were hampered by militia who “corralled” protesters following the shooting. “The planning and preparation exhibited in this (Kenosha Guard) post led to Plaintiffs and other protesters being terrorized, assaulted, harassed, and placed in so much fear when facing the business end of military grade assault rifles that they determined it was too dangerous to continue to protest,” the lawsuit said. The lawsuit also alleges that Facebook allowed a post to remain on its site for weeks calling on people to join the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. A counter-protester, Heather Heyer, was killed when a white nationalist drove his car into her group.
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