Police in Nashua, New Hampshire have arrested what they believe are the culprits behind a string of robberies aided by people who posted too much personal information on Facebook. The robbers, who stole between $100,000 and $200,000, allegedly zeroed in on homes owned by individuals who posted their vacation plans on the social networking website.

 

The three arrested men, Mario Rojas, 25, Victor Rodriguez, 17, and Leonardo Barroso, 17, may have been clever enough to scour Facebook for absent residents, but they weren’t clever enough to hide what they were doing. Because they stole specific type of fireworks from one home, the two-man Nashua burglary unit put out the word to watch for the lighting of fireworks. On August 28, an off-duty officer, Mike Dore, heard firecrackers. When he tracked down the source, he found packaging from the stolen fireworks.

 

The Facebook-related burglary news follows the warnings made by a Netherlands-based website, PleaseRobMe.com, which was created to educate people about the dangers of posting their whereabouts on Twitter.

-David Wallechinsky, Noel Brinkerhoff

 

City Burglary Ring Busted (by Joseph Cote, Nashua Telegraph)

Police: Thieves Robbed Homes Based On Facebook, Social Media Sites (WMUR-TV, New Hampshire)

PleaseRobMe.com Uses Twitter to Tell When People Aren’t Home (by Noel Brinkerhoff AllGov)