Jane Doe’s family was swatted on Tuesday, October 6, after her phone number and address were leaked online, turning a rape lawsuit into a night of false emergency calls and threats at the house. Police arrived just after 7:05 P.M. after a man claimed he was inside and had shot his mother, turned a gun on his sister and was going to kill her too.
The two young men outside were identified as Doe’s brother and boyfriend, and officers quickly determined the call was a hoax. But the harassment did not stop there. While police were still on scene, dispatch reported that the caller was back on the line, this time claiming he had an AR-15 and would kill everyone at the house, then himself. About an hour later, police got another call saying the house was on fire.
Doe told police that her phone number and address had been posted on the internet and that she had already been getting harassing calls that evening. She recorded one call in which a voice said, “I’m probably just gonna, like, pull up to your house and shoot....” She was also getting messages by text and D.M., including one that read, “Typical white btich whore crying ‘rape,’ ” and another that said, “Hopefully someone does the world a favor and 🔫🔫🔫 you, nothing of value would be lost.” Officers told her to keep her phone turned off.
The leak matters because Doe filed her 101-page civil lawsuit anonymously 28 days before the article to protect her identity, alleging she was sexually assaulted by seven students at the Chi Phi fraternity house on October 19, 2024. Within days, details about who she was began to surface online, showing how quickly an anonymous plaintiff can be turned into a target once personal information escapes the court file.
The threat did not end with the police response. According to her attorney, Doe was taping pieces of paper over the windows at the house the next day, trying to shut out a campaign that had already moved from the screen to the front door. What remains unanswered is who first put her information online, and whether anyone will be held to account for the chain of harassment that followed.
