Website search leads to vandalism charges

They tagged property with graffiti all over Stoughton, hitting vehicles and businesses; then they posted pictures of their work and their tag names online, police said.

Beginning in August, Stoughton police said, the trio of teenage graffiti artists caused more than $75,000 in damage.

Charles Diggs, 18, Eric Tankerly, 17, and Raymond Lacasse, 18, were charged yesterday with multiple counts of tagging property and malicious damage.

The suspects were arrested and then released. An arraignment has not yet been scheduled, said Stoughton police Officer Roger Hardy, who along with other officers spent more than two months surfing the popular website Myspace.com for Stoughton youths who were active in the graffiti artist community.

Myspace, a free website, allows users to form networking groups based on shared interests. All three of the teenagers charged were members of a group called ''Graffiti Artists," which features artists from all over the world.

Diggs posted under his tag names AOI, or artificial intelligence, and Cose 1. Tankerly posted under Tres 3, and Lacasse posted under the tag name Sake, Hardy said. The names were identical to markings left throughout town, Hardy said.

Tankerly is a senior at Southeastern Regional Vocational Technical High School in South Easton. Diggs graduated from the school last year, Hardy said. Lacasse is a senior at Stoughton High School. None could be reached for comment.

Stoughton police began using Myspace as an investigative tool about two years ago after parents expressed concern over students posting provocative pictures and obscene comments, Hardy said. About 75 percent of the students in the area post personal information on the site, Hardy said.

''They don't realize that anyone can read it," he said.

The youths marked up more than 30 buildings and dozens of cars, with estimated damages of up to $15,000 per building and $3,000 per car, Hardy said.

''I don't think these kids realized the consequence of the actions or how much it is going to cost them," he said.

While being questioned by police, Hardy said, the teenagers seemed surprised that the officers had read their Myspace.com posts.

''I showed them the pictures of what they wrote, and they were pretty much like 'Wow,' " he said.