Police suspect social media used to spur mall violence
Widespread activity ‘not a coincidence,’ security expert says
Police officials in several cities said Tuesday that they suspect social media were used to organize some of the brawls and disturbances that broke out at more than a dozen shopping malls across the country a day earlier, marring one of the busiest shopping days of the year.
In Aurora, Colo., a posting on social media announcing a fight at the Town Center of Aurora drew an unruly crowd that grew to about 500 people.
Five suspects, all juveniles, were arrested in that fight, which brought 50 officers to the scene and led to the mall being shut down.
In Manchester, Conn., several fights broke out around the same time at the Shoppes at Buckland Hills Mall in that city Monday evening.
Capt. Christopher Davis said police believe it is “highly probable” that social media postings played a part in organizing the disturbances that ended with the arrests of seven people — including five teenagers — who were involved in the melees.
In Beachwood, Ohio, police suspected that about 500 young people who took part in a largescale disturbance at the mall Monday had been loosely organized on social media.
Police in the Cleveland suburb evacuated the mall after teens ran through the shopping center amid incorrect reports that shots had been fired.
The mall’s operators reopened it to shoppers after the situation was calmed.
Other major mall disturbances — including some that led to shopping centers being evacuated — occurred in Tempe, Ariz.; Aurora, Ill.; Louisville; Fayetteville, N.C.; East Garden City, N.Y.; Memphis; Fort Worth and elsewhere.
Images and videos of the brawls and chaotic scenes were posted on Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms.
“There’s a definite connection with social media,” said Chris McGoey, who heads the Los Angeles-based McGoey Security Consulting firm. “This is not a coincidence that on this day, you have all of these similar events happening across the country involving a certain age demographic. If you look at where many of these incidents occurred, they are in cold climates. Added to that, it happened the day after Christmas, most of these individuals were school-age children, and they have nothing to do. And this is the YouTube generation, they record everything, and they want to stimulate things through their social media.”
Law enforcement officials have not uncovered any evidence that the incidents — which occurred at malls in about a dozen states within hours of each other — were nationally coordinated.
Officer Tamara Valle, a Fort Worth Police Department spokeswoman, said officers investigated whether an incident at Hulen Mall, in which 100 to 150 teenagers brawled at the food court, was part of “some kind of premeditated thing across the nation.”
McGoey said mall operators’ most effective deterrence to social-media-driven incidents is to be tough on less serious misconduct, such as loitering and harassment of shoppers. “These incidents aren’t going to get better, they’re probably only going to become more common,” he said.