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By all accounts, Kayla Henriques, 18, and Kamisha Richards, 22, (pictured) were tight. So tight, that Richards threw a baby shower for her friend and was planning a first birthday party for Henriques' son, Alex.
But the young New York City women had a falling out over $20 less than a week ago, when Henriques asked her friend for the money to buy Pampers but used the money for other items.
Over the week, the feud moved to the Internet, where the women traded insults on Facebook through the weekend.
Then it all went tragically wrong. On Monday, Henriques confessed to stabbing Richards at Richards' home in East New York. Police found a kitchen knife at the crime scene and followed a trail of blood to Henriques' nearby home and arrested the young woman, said sources.
Henriques claimed she killed her friend in self-defense. She has been charged with second-degree murder.
Richards, a graduate of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, was awaiting her scores on the law school admittance test and hoped to start law school this fall.
This is hardly the first case of a friendship fight ending in a death, but what seems to set this story apart from others is the role that social media played in fanning the flames of anger between the two participants.
The distance that is part of Internet communication allowed this fight to rage like a wildfire blowing out of control. The back-and-forth messages, which seemed to grow in intensity with each exchange, are easy to send when pecking away at a keyboard.
Would those angry messages have been as easy to exchange face-to-face?
Not likely.
Now all that anyone can do is hold a vigil for the slain woman, as her neighbors did Thursday by sending dozens of white balloons into the night sky outside her apartment.No one can reasonably blame Facebook for causing the death, and no one could have predicted the fight would have escalated to the point of murder.
But it's becoming increasingly clear that a lonely room and computer access embolden people to act in ways they would never consider, if they had to look into the eyes of their target.
Watch the incident here:
Comments: (55)
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By: Li Wright on 3/11/2011 5:50PM
This isn't the first time Facebook/Twitter have fueled fights that led to deaths....those sites should police their users. Honestly, if they had a moderator who watched for that kind of activity and shut them down, it would stop.
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By: Honore on 3/12/2011 7:30AM
These two girls were adults, and NORMAL adults do not need babysitters.
If they had real parents moderating their behaviors when they were growing up they wouldn't have behaved like street thugs, on or off the internet.
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By: blk on 3/14/2011 11:14AM
Yes I agress, but we should not stop there.Lets put moderators in crackhouses,gang tufs,meth houses,and in our capital to watch for political misconduct.Wait we have all that already.Now just imagine that type of oversite within a network that has a larger population then north america.Then you can understand why that wont help
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By: LINDA on 3/14/2011 5:58PM
@Li Wright we can't blame FB responciable for the woman who stabed.The other woman they both where grown 18 and 22 that age is.Not a child this was not an act of two children they were not.8 or 12 she was grown.18 is a adult and she wanted to be grown and take some one's life over 20 dollar's.Now that was childish but she was not a child so she should be.Punished as an adult my preyer's go out to Kamisha Richard's and her family R.I.P KR
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By: EbonyLeaf on 3/11/2011 6:21PM
@ Li Wright ...
Let's just face it! People nowadays lack social skills. I call them "Facebook gangstas"! People love the get crunk behind a keyboard, yet can man-up and deal with the issue face to face. I have dealt with this kind of immaturity before. People use websites like Facebook and Twitter to expose their true selves but when they are in your face, they are fake and the cat gets their tongue!
Facebook/Twitter can police their site all day long, people will be chumps especially this younger generation are grow up behind a keyboard!
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By: EbonyLeaf on 3/11/2011 6:23PM
Sorry for the typos ... I meant to say "yet can't man-up and deal with the issue face to face". Also, I mean to say "especially this younger generation that grow up behind a keyboard"!
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By: Greg on 3/11/2011 8:01PM
Who really cares? If, BW want to only kill themselves over twenty dollars, then like them!
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By: teabaggeredgar on 3/12/2011 7:21PM
Right on GREG. The COLOREDS are trying to blame it on FACEBOOK, Which is WHITE OWNED.
Always blaming someone else for their PROBLEMS.
Get a JOB
Get a EDUCATION.
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By: sweetchocolate on 3/12/2011 10:20PM
uh Greg nobody deserves to have their life taken away from them for something so meaningless, black,white,green yellow or any other color an for you to say something so simple, what does that say about your integrity or your education an by the way I'am a black woman who have a well paying job an bachelor of physcology will soon have a masters degree. do you have a job
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By: Woodstock on 3/13/2011 6:37PM
"SweetChocolate" I have to say it's a sad state of affairs if you can get a Masters Degree with your atrocious writing skills...(although your "handle," SweetChocolate IS intriguing :op ....and Greg, we should all care more about people. If for no other reason, YOUR tax dollars are now going to be supporting this young woman for a looonng time!!! It's bad enough she cut another human beings life short.....she's also trashed her own....and likely not thinking about the "trickle down" effect it will have on her own family members for years to come.... What a WASTE!!!
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