Be careful who you taunt...

[hjmick]

...there could be a psycho at the other end of the internet.

'Nerd' taunt drove Navy man to arson
[/i]Petty Officer Russell Tavares traveled 1,300 miles to torch rival's trailer[/i]
By Angela K. Brown
Updated: 2:02 p.m. PT July 26, 2007

ELM MOTT, Texas - A Navy man who got mad when someone mocked him as a "nerd" over the Internet climbed into his car and drove 1,300 miles from Virginia to Texas to teach the other guy a lesson.

As he made his way toward Texas, Fire Controlman 2nd Class Petty Officer Russell Tavares posted photos online showing the welcome signs at several states' borders, as if to prove to his Internet friends that he meant business.

When he finally arrived, Tavares burned the guy's trailer down.

This week, Tavares, 27, was sentenced to seven years in prison after pleading no contest to arson and admitting he set the blaze.

"I didn't think anybody was stupid enough to try to kill anybody over an Internet fight," said John G. Anderson, 59, who suffered smoke inhalation while trying to put out the 2005 blaze that caused $50,000 in damage to his trailer and computer equipment.

The feud started when Anderson, who runs a haunted house near Waco, joined a picture-sharing Web site and posted his artwork and political views. After he blocked some people from his page because of insults and foul language, they retaliated by making obscene digitally altered pictures of him, he said.

Anderson, who went by the screen name "Johnny Darkness," traded barbs with Tavares, aka "PyroDice."

Investigators say Tavares boiled over when Anderson called him a nerd and posted a digitally altered photo making Tavares look like a skinny boy in high-water pants, holding a gun and a laptop under a "Revenge of the Nerds" sign.

Tavares obtained Anderson's real name and hometown from Anderson's Web page about his Museum of Horrors Haunted House.

Tavares took leave from his post as a weapons systems operator at the AEGIS Training and Readiness Center in Dahlgren, Va., and started driving. Investigators say he told them he planned to point a shotgun at Anderson and shoot his computer.

Instead, when he got to Elm Mott — after posting one last photo of a "Welcome to Texas" sign — Tavares threw a piece of gasoline-soaked plastic foam into the back of Anderson's mobile home and lit a flare, authorities say.

more...

That's what you want to do folks, throw away your future because some anonymous puke in front of a screen half a country away pokes you in the digital eye. I am forever amazed at just how personal some people take things from complete strangers on the web.

 

[Kagom]

Holy shit, someone got really butthurt over the internet.

Oh yeah, that's right: the internet is serious business!

 

[Truthmatters]

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=12167511

his myspace