Madi Hime is taking a deep drag on a blue vape in the video, her eyes shut, her face flushed with pleasure. The 16-year-old exhales with her head thrown back, collapsing into laughter that causes smoke to billow out of her mouth. The clip is grainy and shaky – as if shot in low light by someone who had zoomed in on Madi’s face – but it was damning. Madi was a cheerleader with the Victory Vipers, a highly competitive “all-star” squad based in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. The Vipers had a strict code of conduct; being caught partying and vaping could have got her thrown out of the team. And in July 2020, an anonymous person sent the incriminating video directly to Madi’s coaches.
Eight months later, that footage was the subject of a police news conference. “The police reviewed the video and other photographic images and found them to be what we now know to be called deepfakes,” district attorney Matt Weintraub told the assembled journalists at the Bucks County courthouse on 15 March 2021. Someone was deploying cutting-edge technology to tarnish a teenage cheerleader’s reputation.
But a little over a year later, when Spone finally appeared in court to face the charges against her, she was told the cyberharassment element of the case had been dropped. The police were no longer alleging that she had digitally manipulated anything. Someone had been crying deepfake. A story that generated thousands of headlines around the world was based on teenage lies, after all. When the truth finally came out, it was barely reported – but the videos and images were real.
Deepfake fake news story aside, at the crux of this story is a girl or parent jealous of Madi’s position on the team and was trying to tattle to get her kicked off the team. This story getting ignored was the best result. The girl was 16 and she was caught vaping. Kids are going to do shit they shouldn’t and any hard and fast rule on vices like this is only going to be abused and cause more damage in the long term.
Considering the woman: A) is legally barred from discussing the other families, and B) denies having sent anything to anyone, I think you might be making some pretty broad assumptions. What we do know is that the videos and photos weren’t faked, and they were evidence of misconduct by the other girls, who as of yet have experienced zero consequences and in at least one case may have benefited from the case going viral.
Oh no, a teenager faces zero consequences for vaping. We are doomed! /s
That being said, you are right that the allegations should not be taken as facts, especially considering they came from the same source as those deepfake lies.
Yeah man! Lock that fucking kid UP! Throw the book at that scoundrel!
It was a teen vaping. Fucking chill out.
Teen vaping that lied, convinced others to lie, including parents, & destroyed someone’s life in the process.
Maybe not lock her up, but kick that twat’s ass off the cheer team & take away scholarships.
If you’re willing to lie to the point that you ruin someone’s life, yes you do deserve a lot of fucking blame.
Did they actually do anything you are saying? It was the police who claimed it was a deepfake, not necessarily the kid.
Are you kidding me? You didn’t read the article did you? You just picked side & started downvoting.
Those kids lied the whole way through, saying the videos were fake. They doubled down it. They got the cops involved & were somehow stupid enough to let a pedophile cop take it the point that a woman, likely a family’s, life has been ruined.
No the other mom shouldn’t have narc’d, but if you fuck up and get caught, you don’t get to lie your way out of it at the expense of someone else.
Stop seeing shit so black and white. Everyone involved here is stupid as shit.
Ruined someone’s life who was trying to ruin theirs. Fair play IMO.
No asshole. The first mom went to the other kids’ parents. She tried to at least keep it between the families. Yes, she fucked up with anonymous messages, but that’s pretty fucking minor compared to doubling down a lie to the point the fucking cops get involved.
There are no winners here. The fact that you view any of this to be fair is really fucking sad and I feel bad for your neighbors.
That’s not what she was convicted of. She sent them to the cheerleading organization as well.
She sent REAL videos of the teens acting badly, including her own. One of the other teens LIED claiming the videos were fake.
This was parent contacting other parents about kids fucking up & the other parents opted to trust their lying children over the other adult.
The first mom got charged with harassment because the cops were not able to charge her with deepfaking child porn. The cops tried to charge her as a pedo & opted to slap her wrists for anonymous text messages rather than admit they fucked up too.
Again, no one is right here, but if you think those kids don’t deserve some righteous holy hell for their bullshit then I don’t know what to tell you.
Except, maybe… don’t procreate. Not sure we need your kids running around this planet.
They were vaping and drinking, normal shit 16 year olds do and not hurting anyone. It’s hardly the end of the world. She didn’t just keep it between the families. If she hadn’t tried to fuck them over and get them kicked off the cheerleading team it would have been a non-issue. Doesn’t really matter what the cops initial motivations were. She went through a trial and a jury reviewed the evidence and found her guilty.
I’m more concerned about this loser parent going around stalking 16 year olds being 16 year olds.
This whole story certainly inspires one to despise technology, however.
For real, that’s a story in itself. And then Madi’s old man knows some guys on the force so they say it’s fake, that’s story two. I’m honestly more interested in story one, because some loser is out here stalking this 16-year-old girl so they can screw her shit up, presumably out of jealousy.
My kids will play sports and dance and do whatever. I have no interest in pushing them towards very serious leagues, because time and again the people involved in them have shown they are all losers. My kids will not be professional athletes, we are not particularly tall or strong or fast, but they can do well, be healthy, and make friends, that’s about all I want from it.
Absolutely.
“Helicopter Karen tries to snitch on kids for vaping, but gets fucked by the police instead”.
I sincerely hope everyone involved comes out worse for wear.
No no clearly the best thing to do is to ruin her life over vaping just like kids who lose all the scholarships they earned because they got caught smoking weed. How else are they going to find out how dangerous these things are if we don’t absolutely destroy them in spite of their accomplishments?