First published in the June 2 print issue of the Outlook Valley Sun.
A fake social media account posing as a La Cañada Flintridge resident and posting fraudulent messages prompted her to file a report with law enforcement authorities last week because she feared for the safety of herself and her family.
Kim Hershman, who moved to LCF with her family more than 15 years ago, filed a report with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department classified under two separate offenses: use of electronic communications to instill fear, and a hate crime. The latter was warranted after a Twitter account using a variation of her name was created on May 19 and began posting disparaging remarks about racism, the La Cañada Unified School District’s diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, initiative and other social issues.
At the suggestion of friends, Hershman also submitted a similar report to the FBI and has been in contact with a detective from the Sheriff’s Department who handles cybercrimes. She reported the fake account to Twitter but has had little interaction with the social media company. A Twitter representative replied after Hershman informed them about reaching out to authorities regarding the profile and assured her that the matter is being investigated.
“It is cyber bullying and a racist, hate-filled campaign,” said Hershman, who is Black. “It’s transphobic and misogynistic. It’s sort of, ‘How can we tear down someone by depicting them in the worst way possible publicly?’
“It creates a very dangerous situation for me because … we don’t know who actually connects the dots and thinks I’m an anti-white racist, who thinks I am a person that I am not.”
As of Tuesday, the fake account remained online and offensive remarks were being posted daily.
“They don’t really seem to care about fake accounts, and that’s a bit of an indictment of Twitter,” Hershman stated.
Robert Hahnlein, captain of the Crescenta Valley Sheriff’s Station, told the Outlook Valley Sun Wednesday that cases involving hacking of profiles and creating fake profiles are easy tasks for tech-savvy individuals and can be difficult for detectives to trace.
Though he was unaware of Hershman’s report, he said she has done what is required and said that in cases in which people feel threatened or afraid, the local station can be notified to provide extra patrols in the area.
“Computer stuff is one of the most difficult things my detectives can do,” he said. “If it gets even more threatening, they can find ways to step in, such as looking for IP addresses.”
Hershman was out of the country when the account appeared online and was notified by concerned friends and neighbors about the posts. The profile’s bio section mocks Hershman’s opinions and social status, stating that she is “just an oppressed woman of color living in my little mansion in the town of La Cañada Flintridge, suffering under a lack of diversity, equity and inclusion.”
“It’s so skewed. If you are a person of color of means, the joke is that you shouldn’t care about the other people of color, and you have not experienced any racism. That’s part of the joke,” Hershman said. “If you’re a person of color and speak out against inequities and injustice, that means that you are anti-white.
“I am the least anti-white person,” she continued, “ethnically, I am actually every ethnicity from European, African, Filipino, Indigenous America and Mexico. I am everything. Perhaps that is why this is incredibly absurd to me.”
According to the police incident report, Hershman feared for her and her family’s safety and potential harassment and damage to her public persona. Hershman was concerned “based on the current political climate and racial climate over the past few years in the country.”
Hershman told the Outlook Valley Sun that she and her husband have changed some of their habits since moving to LCF because of concerns over security, including undergoing firearms training. She recently experienced yet another concerning incident Tuesday when a suspicious vehicle associated with California Metro Patrol, a private security service, drove by her residence. The driver used his phone to video record workers from an alarm company at Hershman’s home while installing additional security cameras she purchased. She relayed the information to the detective from the Sheriff’s station.
“It was a wee bit daunting. It’s a little bit scary,” said Hershman, who took a photo of the vehicle, which she has also seen parked outside her residence.
In the report, Hershman stated that the creation of the fake social media account may be related to heated engagements on Facebook that happened between May 9-11, because the fake Twitter account was created more than a week later. One of the comments was regarding an event at Chabad of Crescenta Valley, where the conservative talk show host Dennis Prager was invited to speak. The other incident stemmed from a private Facebook group in which she commented about a complaint that had been filed against La Cañada Elementary Principal Emily Blaney by 31 community members, one of whom is a candidate running for City Council.
That complaint was filed last October against the principal, alleging that she violated several board and administrative regulations when she and other educators discussed the book “White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism.” Authored by Robin DiAngelo, the book examines defensive behaviors exhibited by white individuals when challenged about topics surrounding race, and was a topic of discussion during a collaboration day in the summer of 2020. A consulting firm investigated the matter and found the allegations were not substantiated.
The Zoom meeting between the educators was leaked online by an anonymous internet persona known as VLancer, who posted a series of edited videos and commentaries on the opinions of Blaney and her colleagues and was critical of the district’s DEI efforts.
The videos ignited a debate among parents and prompted the school district to rethink its approach to its DEI implementation plan by including more input from community members.
Though such conversations have at times turned toxic, Hershman remains hopeful that civil discourse can still be had in LCF when it comes to issues of race, and some of that optimism comes from residents who have reached out to her after witnessing the online behavior and how she has become targeted for harassment.
“I still think it’s a beautiful community and there are many, many wonderful people who are dear friends of mine, and unfortunately there is an element that is not wonderful and that is trying to maintain policies that were established in the 1940s,” Hershman said. “I just think moving forward it’s about having honest conversations, and I think that’s what is feared.”
