Official News page 4

REAL LIFE NEWS: CRIMINAL FOUND THANKS TO FACEBOOK: 1

by Hazed

If you're on the run from the law, you want to keep a low profile. After all, if you do anything to advertise your whereabouts, or bring you to the notice of the general public or the authorities, you're going to be found. If you're playing hide n seek you don't pin a big notice above your hiding place saying, "Here I am!"

But this obvious strategy didn't occur to Chris Crego, who absconded after being arrested for assault last fall, having been involved in a serious bar fight in Lockport, NY, near Buffalo. He pled guilty but then didn't show up to be sentenced, so police issued a warrant for his arrest. But he'd already left the state so the likelihood of his being caught wasn't all that high.

Except that savvy detectives checked the internet for mentions of Crego, and found a Facebook page and a MySpace account. And guess what - he'd posted his current residence and place of employment onto the site, a tattoo parlor called Body Art Ink in Terre Haute, Ind. He even helpfully included the times he worked there.

Ok, you could put that down to him maybe forgetting that he was a fugitive from justice... but no, he also proudly displayed the wanted poster that had been published in the paper back in Lockport, boasted of his past criminal history, and predicted he would never be brought back to serve time.

Maybe he didn't know the police owned computers!

Lockport police contacted the US Marshals in Indiana, who tracked him down with not much effort at all. He's now being held pending a request to extradite him back to NY.

As Capt. Richard Podgers said, "If it wasn't for criminals like him our job would be a lot harder." How true. Just to rub it in, the police posted a thank-you note to Crego's Facebook page: "it was due to your diligence in keeping us informed that now you are under arrest."

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