A Facebook user named Manny Whelan spent two years soliciting male high school wrestlers with money to fight in underground clubs at hotels. The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association warned schools after the account was removed. A security expert says parental monitoring, not technology alone, stops predators.
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5:02 now. An underground fight club exposed, and the targets: high school students.
And now school officials are warning parents and students to be on high alert. Our Justin Michaels is live in Franklin with that story. Justin.
Good morning to you, Jackie. Good morning, Christy. The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association does have a very very important warning for parents of male high school athletes this morning. They did post a warning to their website and it reads in part— take a look here right now. This is what it says. They say, in an effort to ensure the safety of our students, we wanted to pass along some critical information regarding a person trying to contact local athletes on Facebook. The person goes by the name Manny Whelan on Facebook and he is offering local student athletes money to, quote, compete in a, quote, underground wrestling club that is held at local hotels. Now, this message goes on to say whoever created that page— and by the way, that page has been taken down— but that person has been soliciting this activity from male student athletes for at least the last 2 years. And a local personal security expert has a warning for parents this morning.
When it comes to, um, these types of technologies, uh, it is the parent's responsibility to monitor who their kids are talking to, what that person's motivation might be. This is This is really not a technology problem. Ultimately, this is a parenting problem, and the more aware parents are, the safer their children are going to be.
Alright, so if you have any information about this, if you think you may have a child that was actually contacted, you do need to call a specific phone number, and it's with the Massachusetts Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. Their phone number is 978-451-3550. Said that pretty quickly. We'll have it on NECN.com for you as well. Very concerning for parents. Just be careful. Make sure you're monitoring that activity online. Back into you. Okay, Justin Michaels live for us in Franklin. Thank you.
