Bad Taste: "Free Maksim Gelman" Group Hits Facebook

It’s not clear if it’s a tasteless joke or an actual attempt to garner support for Maksim Gelman, but a “Free Maksim Gelman Now” group launched on Facebook shortly after his arrest.

There’s little information about the group or who started it, but it’s slowly picking up supporters to, presumably, release the man accused of four murders and seven stabbings – not to mention an attempt to hijack a subway train and the theft of several cars.

Perhaps the only sign of sanity is that the reaction from Facebook users has not been particularly welcoming, with almost every comment condemning the group’s creation. We’d quote a sampling of them, but the amount of expletives involved is a little much even for Sheepshead Bites.

Meanwhile, friends, family and community members are turning to Facebook to reflect on the man who made our neighborhood into a terror-filled killing ground for more than a day, as well as commiserate on the death of 20-year-old Yelena Bulchenko.

Here are a few of the groups that have popped up:

• Maksim Gelman Deserves the Death Penalty
• Send Maksim Gelman to the Electric Chair
• R.I.P. Yelena Bulchenko – We Will Never Forget
• Maksim Gelman – a “community page” operating more like a digital effigy of Gelman, on which people are spitting venom and condemnation.