I think that all the ladies on here should be warned about Runfoolery / aka James Park. Apparently, he is still in the group, which I think is a shame based on his behavior.  

For the record, I am about the last person on earth who wants to be involved in drama or do something like this, but I think it's incredibly important that all the other women on here know about this in case you receive messages from him either on here or on FB b/c he is still a part of this group, at the very least.  At least FOUR other girls on here and I have been the unfortunate recipients of messages from him and they are all in the same vein; they start off kind of innocuous and then get creepier and creepier over time.  He has been warned about it by PM, but I think this warrants him being called out for publicly b/c there might be so many others on here who have been or will be contacted by him.   

By way of background, I didn't know him from Adam when he first contacted me.  This isn't some buddy I had friendly banter with online or joked around with.  He's just some random guy who sent me some PMs out of the blue that while initially I'd describe as brash, turned to creepy relatively quickly. These are our convos from RW:

8/17: re: line was "you're so pretty;" text: "just wanted to say that"

-----> I didn't know him AT ALL at that point. Strange, but I wasn't creeped out or anything by that. I thought it was a little forward, but whatever. I responded nicely, though, saying:

Awww, that is so nice of you! I was having a rough day, so that was nice! It put a smile on my face!"

He then wrote back immediately (all of this was w/in the same hour or so):

pardon me while i try to keep myself from melting...

-----> Fine.  A little strange, but still not creepy. I just didn't respond.

8/18, 9:00 p.m. He PMs me this:


so on a scale of 1-10, how creepy would it be for me to send you a fb friend request just so i can see pictures of your lovely self?


[jaw dropping emoticon is here]


*swoon*....

------->  YUCK.  You want to gawk at my pics? I am creeped out. Everyone on RW knew I was married and had kids.  The kids are referenced in my screen name. I was nervous after receiving this and didn't respond, hoping he'd go away.

He then actually sent me a FB friend request a week or maybe two later.  Not immediate. That made it all creepier.  And scarier.  I have a family and he was making me nervous.  I didn't accept.

Then a month or so later sent me a FB message even though we weren't friends. I can't find it, but I didn't respond. He made some little comments here and there to me/about me on RW, too that were vaguely gross, in addition to the above.  All told, cumulatively and given what I know about what he said to the other girls, it just oozes ickiness.

Then, on 12/1, in this thread - http://www.runningahead.com/groups/BF_and_Beyond/forum/c39b5db3b60548d09aa6880e0992c756/0 - which was about how to set your log to private, I said I worried my running routes were publicly viewable. Someone checked for me and the routes were set to private.  He responded:

Heidi, sadly, your routes are private.

OMG.  I am understandably bothered, given all of the above, by this comment. Flippy jumps in to my defense and says:

Okay, yeah....that comment was a tad creepy. You might want to keep that in check.

He has the gall to respond:

Only a tad? I was hoping for better than that!

He then gets jumped on my a bunch of people for being inappropriate, which he was.

I know something of his interaction with the other ladies and his MO is very much the same as it was in my case.  I think all of you should just be very, very careful around him. I really wish he was no longer a part of this group, but if he has to be, then the other women on here deserve to know about this.

Wow. Didn't know about this, thanks Heidi. I hate creepers.

I just had this conversation with someone else via PM.  I got one message from him while we were still on RWOL:

 

         "i'd be happy to send you inappropriate messages, i know i'm having inappropriate thoughts right now "

 

I ignored him and didn't get any other messages, thank god.  To me, it's one thing to joke in public forum where everyone can see and have a laugh.  It's another to send an unsolicited PM like this to someone.

EXACTLY!  I am glad you piped up, Kay.  I just wanted to ignore it and make it go away, but when I heard of all of these other people getting PMs as of late + that latest contact via the thread, that's when it started to really bother me.  I think I would be doing a dis-service to all the other ladies on here NOT to say something. 

I am sorry that you had to go through that. He sent me an odd pm and I was very short in my respose. I even asked someone about him.

That totally sucks Heidi, please report to the mod's.   Great idea posting not only the name but the substance of his requests.

 

I am always suspicious of any unsolicited PM or request, usually ignoring it.  If it is that important, then a 2nd request is often made.

 

You ladies please be careful.  There are too many creepy guys out there, that's why we earned our reputation and should be treated as guilty before proven innocent.  I am not saying all guys are creeps, just that an abundance of caution is needed.  Notice how there are no threads about girls whistling or shouting out to guys why they are out running!

 

Be careful.

Yes, when you are havign issues, report it to the admins (me, LRB, etc.)  I was on vacation when that thread Heidi mentions happened, so I did not know all the details of it and there are even some deleted posts and everything.  So, if you do not report, assume we might not know.

One of the things that RA does not currently do well is tell you who the "mods" are.  For a situation such as this in a user group, what you need to know are:

Who the OWNER of the user group is... currently that's stealth_rnr.

Who the ADMINS of the user group are... Docket_Rocket is one. 

You can tell both of these by using the "Reports" link on the left side of this post... the menu for this user group.  Admins and Owners are marked in that list with shields and a star.  The problem is that with 543 members, it is too hard to look.

And for something at this level, you would want to include The Man, eric.

Admins can kick a user out of a group.  Only the owner can BAN a user from a group.  What's the difference?  Banning is permanent unless the owner chooses to undo a ban.  A person who is kicked out of a public group can re-add him/herself.  In neither case is the person disappeared from RA... that is a choice for Eric to decide.

mahalo

It's crazy to me how many women he contacted via PM.  Wow.  I had known of 4 others, in addition to these ones I didn't know of...that's crazy. 

One of the things that RA does not currently do well is tell you who the "mods" are.  For a situation such as this in a user group, what you need to know are:

 

Who the OWNER of the user group is... currently that's stealth_rnr.

Who the ADMINS of the user group are... Docket_Rocket is one. 

 

You can tell both of these by using the "Reports" link on the left side of this post... the menu for this user group.  Admins and Owners are marked in that list with shields and a star.  The problem is that with 543 members, it is too hard to look.

 

And for something at this level, you would want to include The Man, eric.

 

mahalo

Currently, stealth has ceded ownership of the group to me.  LRB is an admin as well.