MANHATTAN — A Facebook post made in Harlem about pancakes at an iHop got a teenager off robbery charges that police had stacked against him.
Rodney Bradford, 19, was arrested in connection to an Oct. 17 robbery at the Farragut Houses in Brooklyn, where he lives, according to several published reports.
But his Facebook status, updated one minute before the gunpoint robbery took place, shows that Bradford was at his father's home in Harlem.
"ON THE PHONE WITH THIS FAT CHICK......WHERER MY I HOP," reads the status update believed to have ben posted at 11:49 a.m. on Bradford's page.
The message was apparently an inside joke made to his pregnant girlfriend, the New York Post reported.
Bradford sat on Rikers Island for 12 days. During that time, his defense attorney, Robert Reuland, told prosecutors about the Facebook post, according to the New York Times. Officials from the Brooklyn District Attorney's office then subpoenaed Facebook to confirm that the post came from 71 W. 118th Street, Bradford's father's home.
Once that confirmation was made, charges were dropped.
"CALL ME FACEBOOK KID...," he posted on Oct. 31.
While Bradford is breathing a sigh of relief, his friends were patting him on the back.
"'ON THE PHONE WITH THIS FAT CHICK...' = Epic save!" one friend appeared to have posted to Bradford's Facebook wall on Wednesday. "[W]ell played brother..."
