Защитница животных
Cleveland Heights woman charged with using Facebook to hire killer
Published: Tuesday, February 21, 2012, 6:40 PM Updated: Wednesday, February 22, 2012, 12:13 AM
By James Ewinger, The Plain Dealer
View full sizeU.S. Department of JusticeMeredith Lowell
A Cleveland Heights woman with an apparent passion for animal rights remains in federal custody today. Federal prosecutors say she tried to hire an assassin through Facebook to kill "someone who is wearing fur."
Federal agents arrested Meredith Lowell, 27, Tuesday morning at her home, charged with solicitation to commit murder.
After her initial appearance Tuesday in U.S. District Court, her case was bound over to a grand jury. A detention hearing is set for next Tuesday.
A 14-page affidavit describes a person who wanted someone slain for wearing fur near the Coventry Branch of Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library. In online correspondence with an undercover federal agent, she said she wanted to be present, and was prepared to hand out information about the fur industry after the killing was consummated.
Lowell, according to the federal document, corresponded with an undercover federal operative between November and this month.
The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force and Cleveland Heights police began investigating after the bureau received information in early November that a woman using the name Anne Lowery was trying to solicit a killer on Facebook.
The woman, who prosecutors say was Lowery, wrote that "I would like to create an online community on facebook whi8ch would allow me to find someone who is willing to kill someone wearing fur toward the end of October 2011 or early November 2011 or possibly in January 2012 or February 2012 at the latest."
She wanted the person to live in Northeast Ohio and offered "to pay this person up to $830-$850 which is far more than I was originally willing to pay."
Lowell, writing as Lowery, variously referred to the potential slaying as a hit, a demonstration and a protest, and wondered on Facebook whether she should bring fur advertisements collected during some unspecified investigation into the fur industry, according to the affidavit.
The FBI subpoenaed Facebook account information to help identify Lowell as the woman calling herself Anne Lowery.
At one point, the federal agent urged Lowell to take down comment on her Facebook page about murdering anyone, and she appears to have complied.
In a mid-November email between her and the agent, outside of Facebook, she said she could only afford to pay $730, and advised him "top bring a gun that has a silencer on it and that can be easily concealed in your pants pocket or coat. Do not wear anything that even remotely looks like fur. If you do not want to risk the possibility if getting caught with a gun before the job, bring a sharp knife that is at least 4 inches long."
She went on to specify that she wanted the person "to be dead in less than 2 minutes (under 2 minutes or 1 minute or less would be better.)"
In another message she told the agent "I am paying you to kill one person wearing fur who is 12 or older (but hopefully at least 14 years however 12 years old or older is fine.)"
She went on to write that "I plan on staying after the hit for reasons of benefit to the movement. And I think being caught would actually benefit me personally."
In a later note, she said she wanted to linger at the site of the hit "partially to get away from the house," and also wrote disdainfully of family members who ate meat, wore leather, or otherwise appeared indifferent to her cherished cause.
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