meredith lowell animal activistThe days of Facebook being used by horny college kids to hook up with one another are long, long gone. In 2012, the social network has been hijacked by people with much less sympathetic intentions: Money and murder. Why else would we be talking about a woman by the name of Meredith Lowell today?

Lowell, you see, is reportedly an animal activist who planned to pay a hitman $730 to gun down a random person wearing fur outside of a Cleveland library. She allegedly posted on a Facebook page established under the alias Anne Lowery: "I would like to create an online community on Facebook which would allow me to find someone who is willing to kill someone who is wearing fur toward the end of October 2011 or early November 2011 or possibly in January 2012 or February 2012 at the latest."

Yesterday, Lowell was arrested on one charge of conspiracy to commit murder.

The FBI took notice of the posting and an undercover employee corresponded with Lowell, pretending to agree to get the job done. Apparently, she had solicited the potential hitman, asking him to kill the first person he saw outside of the library who was wearing fur and "preferably 14 years old or older but should be at least 12 years old."  

Wow. You can't make this stuff up!

I'll be the first to defend the Internet usually and say you can encounter crazies just about anywhere in "real life," too. For instance, can critics of online dating honestly argue that they've never had a psycho date they met at a bar or a wedding? Nope. But this kind of incident is proof positive that Facebook has entered a whole new realm of nutty. When "misguided, dangerous" animal activists are creating fake profiles to find hitmen, I have to wonder ... is Facebook the new Craigslist?!

I knew Zuck had cut off his nose to spite its face when it opened its doors to high schoolers, but now you never know what kind of looney toon might be lurking behind that friend request. Scary ... and just one more reason to sign off.

Do stories like this make you leery of Facebook?

 

Image via Department of Justice