Stopping potential killers on hate sites proves tough
They chat on Twitter and post on Facebook about their favorite parts of guns and how to obtain precursor chemicals to make bombs.
On websites such as 8chan and messaging apps such as Telegram, they laud Hitler and demonize minorities, immigrants and Jews and spew violent fantasies. They post photos on Instagram and Snapchat of themselves wielding weapons.
And they worship those who have already committed mass shootings, including those at Christchurch, New Zealand, and in Charleston, S.C.
But it can be difficult for law enforcement to determine which of these posts are just juvenile rhetoric and which pose a serious threat to the public.
As local, state and federal law officers descend on El Paso and Ohio to investigate the casualties, they must race to identify who the shooters were talking to and what they’ve been doing online.
As part of the El Paso investigation, FBI agents have interviewed some of the acquaintances of shooting suspect Patrick Crusius in Allen, near Dallas, where three search warrants were served Monday, and in San Antonio.
“The FBI San Antonio office has been conducting interviews of individuals that know the subject,” FBI special agent Jeanette Harper, a spokeswoman for the FBI in El Paso, said by email Monday. “That’s all the information I can give at this time.”
Harper said no searches have been conducted in San Antonio in connection with the El Paso investigation.
Former federal agents familiar with such large investigations said agents are likely following up on leads and information gleaned from Crusius’ cellphone.
“I’m sure they’re trying to see if there’s any connection with Ohio and whether there’s any other potential future incident,” said one retired federal agent, who asked for anonymity because he is known among the FBI in West Texas. “When they get into the phone, they look at the contacts and tell investigators elsewhere, ‘Here’s what we found, find out as much information as you can about this.’”
As part of the probe, agents are looking for anyone else who might be mobilizing toward committing mass violence, according to former agents and other observers.
“What’s happening is someone who is radicalizing is becoming a member of a group, and this group feels its identity is under threat. That is their perception,” said Dimitrios Kalantzis, director of communications for Life After Hate, a Chicago nonprofit made up of former white supremacists that helps people “de-radicalize” from hate.
Online, those “grievances” are repeated in an echo chamber that resonates with those who are vulnerable, he said.
“When does person X finally act on these grievances? That is what law enforcement is grappling with,” Kalantzis said. “Most people are not going to commit a crime. A recruiter is banking on just one person. The Internet puts them in touch with millions. That’s what makes these forums so potent.”
When agents push for information on certain sites or try to shut them down, they might get pushback from social media companies and First Amendment advocates, retired FBI agent Mike Appleby noted.
“It’s very hard to stop these guys,” Appleby said. “Unless someone … posts a manifesto and leaves it there for a few days or weeks, or someone calls in and says, ‘You might want to take a look at this guy,’ it’s very, very difficult.”
Current FBI agents say they believe they stopped one potential threat: New Braunfels resident Benjamin Bogard, a lanky white military kid who spent much of his time gaming online and making increasingly “disturbing” and racist posts that began sometime last year.
A tip to Crime Stoppers in Albany, N.Y., in November about his posts on Instagram put him under FBI watch. After monitoring him for months, agents found he made videos and posts of himself in neoNazi garb, saluting Hitler and advocating violence against minorities. What worried agents more was that he bought a shotgun as he continued making his posts.
“I think the time they spend in these boards, talking in these hate groups, normalizes that behavior,” said one law enforcement source familiar with the Bogard case not authorized to speak with the media.
It’s unclear whether Bogard, who turns 21 next week, truly intended violence. Agents arrested him in early February, not on terrorism charges but on charges of child pornography over explicit images found on his phone. He pleaded guilty to a lesser child exploitation charge in May.
He told agents that Instagram kept suspending his account so he created new ones or moved to other social media sites. But he claimed his intent was only to gain “likes” and that he never intended violence against anyone.
“Fortunately, his rhetoric, such that he used in these groups, never came to fruition,” said Senior U.S. District Judge David Ezra, who sentenced Bogard on Monday to six years and eight months in prison. “Whether he intended it to at some point in time, who knows?”
The posts, agents testified, included a story Bogard posted about where to buy a precursor for explosives, discussions on Twitter that his favorite firearm part is “the part that kills 30 babies per trigger pull;” a chat about buying a new gun and ammunition and “going ham on the state capitol.”
One video on his phone showed Bogard racking a shotgun and talking about shooting blacks, Jews and Hispanics, while making derogatory comments about them.
Agents have been trying to identify others whom Bogard had contact with, but had not charged anyone else as of Bogard’s sentencing on Monday — six months after his arrest.
In the case of El Paso massshooting suspect Crusius, a racist manifesto linked to him was posted anonymously on the online board 8chan minutes before he allegedly shot and killed 22 people and injured several more at a Walmart in El Paso on Saturday.
That is very little time for anyone to identify who posted the screed beforehand to have prevented the El Paso attack, former agents said.
Public documents and investigators have identified no apparent link between Bogard and Crusius. But agents readily criticize social media sites that have been slow to act on posts that advocate violence, or for providing a platform to promote it.
“You gotta have some scrutiny on these things,” ex-agent Appleby said, echoing other agents who requested anonymity.
The 8chan website has been under scrutiny for months. FBI agents in California investigating April’s hate-related shooting at the Poway Synagogue north of San Diego filed a search warrant in June to try to find identifying information about others communicating with the 19-year-old shooter.
It also has been identified in three cases as a source of mass shootings, with the latest the one in El Paso. Robert Evans, who writes for Bellingcat, an online investigative journalism organization, wrote in a previous post on Bellingcat that after the shooter who attacked two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, posted a racist manifesto on 8 chan in March, it was used as inspiration by the Poway synagogue shooter.
The El Paso shooting suspect also allegedly cited the Christchurch manifesto in his own screed posted on 8chan.
The 8chan site was shut down temporarily Monday after Cloudfare, its website security provider, stopped providing services. It soon found another provider, but that company also terminated the site’s service. The message board has a Twitter account that it has continued to use during the outages, but pressure was mounting on Twitter to cut off 8chan’s account.