Literally a matter of a few thousand dollars.
In April 2020, a 60-year-old man, Mark Herring, from Bethpage, Tennessee, was SWATted. After initially responding with a gun in hand, he tossed his weapon away upon realizing he was not dealing with trespassers, but rather the police. He then suffered a heart attack; one from which he did not recover.
And all of this happened due to the fact that he refused to give his “rare” Twitter handle, @Tennessee, over to an extortionist.
It would be several months before Herring’s family learned of the extortionist, Shane Sonderman. Sonderman is, coincidentally, a minor. He had been targeting multiple parties for their rare Twitter handles, which could be sold for anywhere between $3000-$4000.
He was from Tennessee. He’s the one that collected all our information, my address, my sister’s, my moms, my my other sister, and put it on a channel on Discord, which is a gaming chat forum.
Corinna Fitch, daughter of Mark Herring
Herring’s other family members believe he was quite literally scared to death.
Sonderman gathered information in an attempt to intimidate Herring into surrendering his account. And, when he didn’t get what he wanted, he dropped the dox on Discord. After which, some undisclosed minor from the United Kingdom (UK authorities don’t reveal the identities of suspects which are minors) made the fateful call to the Bethpage police department that ultimately led to the death of Mark Herring.
As for the minor from the UK, due to his status as a minor,he will neither be identified or extradited. Shane Sonderman, however, is not quite so fortunate. Sonderman had been running this extortion scheme on several other rare handle owners, of which Herring was one of six, and the only one to have died as a consequence of his actions. Sonderman is currently in jail awaiting trial. If convicted, he faces up to 5 years in prison and a $200,000 fine.
Herring’s family, however, considers this punishment inadequate.
You’ve not just changed that one person’s life, you’ve done a ripple effect. They need to pay for that.
Corinna Fitch
Source: PC Gamer
About Author
