Utica, N.Y. - An effort is underway to make sure what happened to a Utica family following the gruesome death of Bianca Devins does not happen again.
Bianca Devins had her throat slashed in Utica the day of the Boilermaker Race and the grizzly imaged were shared online by the Cicero man accused of killing her. Those pictures were shared over, and over, and over again until they went viral.
Then those images were sent to her family, including Bianca's Grandfather Frank Williams.
"Just after hearing the news of losing our 17-year-old Bianca, we started receiving notices on social media - private messages with the graphic photos of Bianca's death," Williams said. "Many of these private messages said ‘look at your daughter now.’ We cannot understand the emptiness of someone's heart and the cruelty that would make them do such a thing."
It appalled Congressman Anthony Brindisi.
"The pain of losing a child is unimaginable," said Brindisi. "To have that pain exploited, mocked, and shred on social media is a trauma that no family should ever have to go to. What shocks me the most is that even when the family reported some of these graphic images they were not taken down."
Brindisi says he has written letters to Facebook, which owns Instagram, along with the FTC asking them to investigate what went wrong. He wants social media companies to review their moderation policies in the aftermath of Bianca's murder.