Editor's Note: The name of the accused has been removed from this story due to the charges being withdrawn.
An Orillia teenager is the first to admit he’s not been a poster child for staying on the straight and narrow.
Last year, he dropped out of high school and openly admits he has an ongoing problem with substance and alcohol abuse.
He knows many people think he’s weird; he mostly blames himself for that.
So when he was arrested for committing an “indecent act” in Couchiching Beach Park last April, most people were quick to believe social media accounts that said he was caught masturbating in front of young kids.
Some posters claimed to have a video of the offence.
When his name was published in OrilliaMatters, a sister site of BarrieToday, and other media outlets, his story went viral — at least locally.
People immediately tended to believe the story and the pile-on began.
He tells OrilliaMatters he was called names, threatened, taunted and virtually hid in his house.
“It was absolutely terrifying,” he said.
Earlier this week, the charge against the 19-year-old was withdrawn, confirmed lawyer Josh Fagan.
The lawyer said it was one of those unusual circumstances in which someone thought they saw something that was one thing, but, in reality, was something different.
According to the teen, he was drinking beer in the park, was, by his own admission, intoxicated, and was urinating in the bush when a woman with young kids saw him.
He said he takes a medication that causes a bladder issue that, essentially, requires him to push on his bladder while he urinates.
“I can see how, from behind, she might have thought it was something different,” he said.
“I’m not mad at her. She was just doing what she thought was right to protect her kids.”
Soon after she called 911, the police arrived and arrested him. Inebriated, he didn’t understand the gravity of what he was facing.
“I was just like every other Orillia kid, getting drunk in the park,” he said. “I didn’t really see it, at the time, as doing anything wrong.”
Then, his world caved in. Most of his friends abandoned him and he became a pariah.
And, much of it was his own doing, he says now.
“I’ve made mistakes,” he said. “I haven’t been necessarily too nice to lots of people. I just give off the wrong vibe to people … a lot of people thought I was weird, so they were quick to jump on the bandwagon and believe it all.”
For the 19-year-old, the arrest and subsequent backlash has been an epiphany of sorts.
“I was on a downward spiral and getting arrested was kind of hitting rock bottom,” he said.
Over the intervening months, he tried to stop doing drugs and drinking alcohol. It has not been easy and it remains a process, he says.
The teen, who is adopted, knows his natural father was a drug addict and realizes he is “predisposed to addiction.”
He has been assisted by a YMCA program and has “started to get into Christianity” — both of which, he says, have been helpful.
He is going to Georgian College five days a week and hopes to wrap up a course in April that will result in him completing his Grade 12 education. He is also working part-time at Georgian College as a cleaner.
His future may involve producing music, locally.
“But it’s hard, because everyone thinks I’m a pedophile or something,” he says.
While he doesn’t really care what people think any more, he hopes now that the charge has been withdrawn, people might be willing to give him a second chance.
His mom says the last seven months have been trying. She hopes this case might force people to think before they jump to conclusions and vilify a person online.
“He has been threatened, online and in person, to the extent that he has been fearful in public,” says this mom. “(He) was told by a number of people to kill himself ...people who don't know him and are completely ignorant of the facts.”
She said it’s fortunate that he “is a strong young man” who has had the “support of a few caring individuals.”
She thinks the experience exposes the dangers of social media.
”The ability of a small piece of information to persecute someone is Salem-esque,” says the mother.
“When this started, someone posted online that they had a video of (him) doing something horrendous. People accepted that as fact. However, it was clear during the court process that no such video existed, and it was confirmed by the individual who posted the statement that no video ever existed.
“People accepted the video as ‘evidence’, but there never was one. This is only one example of false information that perpetrated bullying and abuse that has damaged (his) reputation and well-being,” she added.
“When misinformation is adopted as truth, the truth becomes irrelevant. His life will forever be impacted. People cowardly hide behind the anonymity of the internet to judge others. This can happen to anyone,” she says.
“The justice system did not fail (him), but much of his community did. This matter has been dismissed, but the impact of what has been done to (him) cannot be so easily dispensed with.”
The teenager says he harbours no ill will to those who jumped to judgment.
“I feel sorry for those people. They have to put down other people they don’t even know? They’re clearly not happy if they’re willing to rip someone apart when they don’t even know what happened,” he said.
