A suburban Chicago mother is taking Twitter to court in hopes they will hand over the identities of individuals who have been tormenting her minor daughter using the social network.
According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Rose Martorana-Lollino, of Elmwood Park, Ill., is petitioning Twitter to help her family find out who has been posing as the girl and -- via Twitter accounts @dreadfulFATchic and @dreadfullyLARGE -- bullying her for being overweight.
Both Twitter accounts have been suspended and are no longer active as of this writing, but according to a pre-lawsuit discovery filing, the accounts posted tweets such as "my passion is being fat" and "my passion is gaining weight" and listed her phone number while inviting Twitter users to "sext" her.
NBC Chicago reports the person or persons behind the Twitter accounts posted additional private information about the minor, including her name, photo and her city of residence.
Attorney Daliah Saper admitted it can be difficult to find out who is behind cyberbullying like what his client's family has endured, Fox Chicago reports.
"Since these are all civil causes of action and until there are statutes that directly address this type of behavior, your recourse is only to ask for monetary damages which can be very difficult to prove and again you will have to expend extraordinary amounts of resources depending on the court system you're in order to get to an actual judgment," Saper told the station.
Neighbors of the girl sang the praises of the family to ABC Chicago and one of them added, "It makes sense to me. It very much makes sense and I think I would do the same thing too."
Cyberbullying has figured prominently in several other high-profile stories that have received national media attention in recent weeks.
Bullying is said to have been a major factor in the Sept. 9 suicide of a 12-year-old Florida girl and a 12-year-old student at a Connecticut private school was arrested this month after repeatedly tormenting a 13-year-old female classmate.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this story incorrectly identified Daliah Saper as the family's attorney in this case.