EXCLUSIVE: The Cornell 7 Lawsuit Served the Wrong Person. Now He’s the Target of an Internet Mob. Mom of the mistakenly identified Matthew Ingalls begs vigilantes to leave them alone. ‘My family’s been terrorized, threatened, and harassed.’ @FrannieBlock reports for @TheFP At 8 p.m. on Saturday night, Victoria Ingalls heard a banging sound at her front door. There was a man standing outside her house in upstate New York. “Is Matthew Ingalls your son?” he asked. Victoria’s son is an active duty sergeant in the Marine Corps. “My heart went in my throat,” she told me. She assumed she was about to hear the news that every military family dreads. Instead, the man handed her an envelope with a 101-page lawsuit inside, accusing her son of being among seven Cornell university students who allegedly raped and sexually abused a female student, identified as Jane Doe, over the course of seven hours at the Chi Phi fraternity house in October 2024. But Victoria’s son, 23, never attended Cornell. The court, the family soon figured out, had served the wrong Matthew Ingalls and had added the Ingalls’ home address to the official docket. Online vigilantes targeting the alleged perpetrators of the alleged gang rape didn’t know that. They began searching Matthew Ingalls’ name as soon as the lawsuit was filed, and when they found details about Sergeant Ingalls and his family, they started posting the family’s details, including their phone numbers, on the internet. In one post on X, an individual posted her son’s address with the caption: “This is definitely NOT Matthew Ingalls’ new phone number and address!. . . . Posting this for public awareness so people know to NOT reach out.” In another post, Victoria said she came across posts with her son’s name on them, with pictures of woodchippers and captions like “we can’t get caught if they can’t find bodies.” Victoria’s daughter, 26, received a text message with a photo of the Cornell student Matthew Ingalls and a screenshot of a Google Earth image of her brother’s house. Her mother said she had no idea what it meant at the time, but she now understands it to be a clear threat. Then, Victoria said, the texts became more extreme: “Do the world a favor and go kill yourself,” read one. “Get fucked in the ass to death bitch” and “Kill yourself,” read others. “My family’s been terrorized, threatened, and harassed,” Victoria told me. “I am just amazed at the way people behave. I can’t believe that people will just look someone up on the internet, take a phone number, and start texting someone or calling someone and saying the vile things they’re saying. You don’t even know if you have the right person. You’re creating more victims.”