A woman in France livestreamed her suicide on Periscope Tuesday. Right before throwing herself in front of a train, the 19-year-old, whose name has not been released, “made statements to Internet users via the Periscope application to explain her act,” prosecutor Eric Lallement told Agence France-Presse.
The series of videos, which have been removed from Periscope but were uploaded to YouTube, shows the woman smoking a cigarette and speaking to the camera. In a translation from the New York Times, she allegedly says, “The video I am doing right now is not made to create buzz, but rather to make people react, to open minds, and that’s it.”
According to Lallement, she also sent a text to an ex-boyfriend a few hours before her death. “In the text message, she mentions violence and a rape that her companion inflicted on her and claims she is ending her days because of the harm that the young man had done to her.” French authorities have opened an investigation into the case and are working to obtain the original Periscope videos, according to the Times.
Periscope, the Twitter-owned app that allows users to livestream video, has been named in a number of cases recently. Last month, an Ohio woman was indicted for streaming another woman’s sexual assault on the app, and a man may have accidentally livestreamed his own death after a shooting broke out in a strip club.
In a statement, Twitter said, “We do not comment on individual accounts for privacy and security reasons. However, the content has been reported and removed.”
For more information about suicide prevention or to speak with someone confidentially, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (U.S.) or Samaritans (U.K.).
