I was getting ready for bed when Lincoln called with the news. It was a little after ten. Sammy had already gone to bed.
Lincoln was constantly on Twitter. When he saw it, Lincoln knew it was going to be big. “You gotta get in front of this, bro.” Then he turned conspiratorial. “People are starting to line up for my state Senate seat. I been trying to respect your space and hold them off from announcing, but this could be a real opportunity. Me run for Congress. You run for my spot. Perfection.”
My stomach turned at my brother’s political calculations as I scrolled through a series of Twitter posts on my cell phone. “Now’s not the time,” I said, squinting at the tiny screen. “I’m serious about running, more serious than I’ve ever been, but I’m not quite there. I got a real job to do, and I still have to find Sammy a new school and get her settled there.”
Lincoln sighed. Even over the telephone, I could tell that he was rolling his eyes at me. “That’s where you’re wrong,” he said. “This is the perfect time.”
“Whatever.” I tapped through a series of links and eventually found the original source. “Thanks for letting me know about this.” I hung up the phone and stared at the string of Twitter posts, trying to make sense of who had posted them and why.
As I read each one, an uneasiness rolled over me.
This isn’t good.
It started with a picture posted of Jimmy Poles holding a gun and a Confederate flag. I remembered the photo from the file that Emma and Nikolas had compiled. Below the photo was the statement: Why is this man suspended? #LostBoysRemembered #STLtruth.
The post was made by a person called @STLtruth. It was a relatively new Twitter account, but there were enough followers to plant the seeds.
An hour later, another photo with the same hashtags, this one a picture of Jimmy Poles wearing a black T-shirt with a pair of large, cartoonish white eyes printed on the front. Below the eyes were the words OUR PRESIDENT. This one had the descriptor: Saint Louis Probation Officer Jimmy Poles #LostBoysRemembered #STLtruth.
An hour after that, another photo of Jimmy Poles was posted. He wore an orange prison jumpsuit, blackface, and an afro wig. Below the photo was the statement: Two things all Lost Boys have in common: Jimmy Poles and they are black #LostBoysRemembered #STLtruth. It was an exaggeration, but few people would know.
Black Twitter picked it up first, and the story built to a boil; then the traditional media couldn’t ignore it anymore. Questions were asked. Accusations went back and forth, and then the Jimmy Poles story got bigger.
The speed at which information and the pictures spread was stunning. The Lost Boys were no longer merely a tragedy in flyover country. Each minute that passed, the intensity grew and, with that, a movement.
@STLtruth began posting pictures of the Lost Boys, including pictures of the crime scene. Photos of bones and shallow graves. Then came the boys’ juvenile system files.
The posts and information established credibility. Although the true identity of @STLtruth was unknown, it didn’t matter. What he or she was posting was clearly authentic.
Monthly probation officer reports that Jimmy Poles filed for each of the identified Lost Boys were posted. One every ten minutes. Most of the information was blacked out, but the reports themselves weren’t important. @STLtruth wanted to prove that Jimmy Poles was the common thread that ran through the murders, the person who connected all the Lost Boys together.
The furor grew.
The anonymous person had put Jimmy Poles on trial and convicted him through the Internet. It was inflammatory. It wasn’t fair, but it was effective. No mainstream reporter could have done what he or she was doing. This was the new world. The fact that Missouri law made juvenile files confidential didn’t matter.
The next morning, I sat in my office and watched it unfold, going from the anonymous fringe of the Internet to the mainstream by midmorning. “You seeing all this?” I scrolled through the Twitter feed again, on my computer.
Emma stood over my shoulder, taking it all in.
I looked up at her. “I have to call Schmitty.”
She nodded and then stared out at her desk in the other room. The phone had been ringing nonstop all morning as the story grew. “What do you want me to do about all the calls?”
I shrugged. “Don’t know. Guess we have to answer. Can’t just shut down.”
“Fine.” She patted me on the back, then returned to the reception desk.
As she was closing the door, I shouted at her. “Hey, Emma.”
“Yes.” She poked her head back inside my office.
“Any chance Nikolas is doing this? Maybe he thinks it’s helping me.”
She paused, considering the possibility. Then she shook her head. “Don’t think so. Not really his style, but I will ask.”
“OK.” I nodded. “Thanks.” I picked up the phone, looked at the Post-it Note on my desk that had Schmitty’s phone number, and dialed as Emma shut the door to my office.
Schmitty picked up after one ring. “Glass. What the hell?”
“I was going to ask you the same thing.”
“So you’re not doing this?”
“Of course not,” I said, perhaps too defensively. “Thought maybe you were doing it, trying to smoke him out.”
“Are you kidding?” I could hear the panic in Schmitty’s voice. “This ain’t gonna end well, my friend. Gotta go. The damn governor is on our ass, worried about another Ferguson. Call me if you figure out who’s posting this stuff.”
By sunset, there were a thousand people gathered outside Jimmy Poles’s house, shouting and chanting. Somebody on a megaphone instructed the crowd to disperse, but the command was ignored. Two helicopters circled overhead, one a police tactical unit, the other a news crew. There were moments where it looked like the two would collide. Plus there were at least five knuckleheads flying remote-controlled drones with cameras mounted on them.
In a McDonald’s parking lot six blocks away, four armored Missouri National Guard vehicles reviewed maps of the area. A small army of police officers suited up in full riot gear. A similar contingent prepared at a pharmacy on the other side of Jimmy Poles’s house.
The plan was to simultaneously approach the protesters from each side, press them together, pinch them at one end, and push the crowd toward the highway and out of the residential area.
It was the best strategy that they could come up with. Nobody expected it to go smoothly, but somebody should’ve known that it was going to be a complete failure.
A call was made, and the two units started their slow march. Squad cars and police officers eventually formed a corridor leading from Jimmy Poles’s house toward the highway. The squads and police officers were intended to limit the choices that the protestors could make by keeping them together and cutting off alternative routes.
Contain and control.