He may have been a few hours late, but a Newfoundland man who vowed to police over Facebook that he would turn himself in has kept his promise.
Newfoundland police said over Twitter Monday afternoon that Rodney Constantine had “kept his word” and turned himself over to authorities after saying he would so in a Facebook comment -- to police.
On Saturday, the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary used their Facebook and Twitter accounts to appeal to the public in helping finding Constantine, who was wanted on four warrants, including failing to attend court and breaching court orders.
Not shy -- nor apparently trying to elude authorities -- Constantine responded using his own Facebook account. He wrote on the post: “See you Monday morn !!!!!”
The unusual example of the power of social media in policing took another bizarre twist in the comment’s section, where Constantine and police began a correspondence of sorts.
After noting that everyone is innocent until proven guilty, police wrote: “We commend Mr. Constantine for acknowledging these charges and hopefully he will contact us to have the matter dealt with properly in court.”
Constantine took to Facebook again, just to make it clear he was serious about his imminent surrender: “Look just letting everyone know this ain’t a joke or intended !!!! I was just been honest about turning in Monday morn that’s all !!!”
The unusual back-and-forth sparked a slew of comments from Facebook users, including one person who said police should offer free pick-up and drop-off service for wanted persons.
The police also took the opportunity to chastise people making rude remarks.
“We also would ask that people commenting on posts consider a more tactful and less offensive tone as many of your comments are being ‘hidden’ for simply being outright offensive toward other users or the accused.”
The “wanted” post seeking the accused has since been deleted from the RNC’s Facebook page, but police did post news of Constantine’s arrest, saying he will be seen by a provincial court judge Tuesday morning.
