Court declares “liking” Facebook photos could violate restraining order

Earlier, a Pennsylvania county court arraigned a man on charges of contempt of court because he clicked a “like” button in possible breach of a restraining order that had been filed by his ex-girlfriend against him.

April Holland filed a protection from abuse (PFA) order against her ex-boyfriend Justin Bellanco in July 2015, which was granted.

Forbidding Bellanco from having any contact with Holland for a year. He was arrested on Monday after she told local authorities that he “liked” 22 of her photos and videos on her Facebook page.

Bellanco said he did not know that “liking” Facebook photos constituted a PFA violation, according to police. Officers confirmed the PFA against Bellanco was still active, then spoke with a Luzerne County assistant district attorney, who confirmed that Bellanco’s actions constituted a PFA violation.

Bellanco, in response, said “they were actually posts on my facebook wall… nothing I liked appeared on her Facebook … we weren’t friends on facebook and I was planning on deleting my account and wanted to save some photos so I had them backed up …. I liked a bunch of stuff while I was out so when I got home I would be able to just go to my activity log and easily find what I wanted to save… unfortunately she received notification of me liking certain posts that she was tagged in.. I was not aware that she would receive any notification due to the fact we were no longer friends… and I was not able to remove her tag from posts”

He further said “yes I honestly was under the assumption that she wouldn’t have gotten notification of what I was liking… sad part is I had her phone number blocked and she downloaded a texting app to call me and set me up 2 weeks ago”

He continued, wholly denying the charges that Holland made against him.

“and never… not once did I ever threaten to shoot her… so I don’t know where she came up with the whole me shooting her in knee caps and watching her suffer… about a month ago she grabbed one of my pistols off of my dresser and chambered a round .. when I tried getting the gun off of her she was waving it around and pointing it in my direction with her finger on the trigger. I had to call 911 and have the police remover her from my house.. I begged them not to press charges and that i only wanted her to leave my property… and within the last 4 months she beat the living hell out of me and I again had to have the cops remove her from my property and did not press charges… but now seeing the way she is acting I’m really regretting letting her get away with all of that.. I never put my hands on her and it really hurts me that she is acting this way”

After being arraigned, Bellanco was released on $5,000 bail.