Constable: '13 years just gone,' says Glenview man deleted from Facebook

When his 94-year-old mother died in April 2020 and pandemic restrictions limited her funeral to eight people, Facebook is the place where Jon Rachiele of Glenview mourned with more than 200 friends and relatives, who posted wonderful stories about his mom.

That's gone.

That tribute Rachiele made in honor of his long-dead father with old photographs and articles from World War II?

Gone.

The collection of more than 450 recipes he documented on Facebook with comments and photographs of the meals he made?

Gone.

His postings about church, reunions with fraternity brothers, gatherings with fellow Valparaiso University alums, and family graduations, dances and vacations?

Gone, gone, gone and gone.

“It's kind of sci-fi,” Rachiele says. “They wipe out your existence by pushing a button. Thirteen years just gone.”

He doesn't understand why Facebook did that, and he doesn't know how he can get it back.

Rachiele, a 55-year-old technology, analytics and implementation leader at Alight Solutions in Lincolnshire, had been a part of the Facebook community for 13 years. “

I use Facebook multiple times every day,” he says, figuring that he had spent about three hours a day reading posts and news, checking in with friends and posting things about his own life.

That changed in February. “I was in a meeting at work, actually in the office for the first time in a million years.” Rachiele says. He wanted to show his co-workers a video from Facebook and got a message saying his account was disabled.

“They said I violated the community standards for Facebook,” says Rachiele, who says he has no idea how that could have happened, since everything he posts is seen by his kids, his pastor and others whom he doesn't want to offend.

“I know my audience. I'm not going to do something outlandish.”

He visited the help pages Facebook suggested and followed the rules to appeal that decision, receiving a message back that noted, “If we find that your posts or comments didn't follow our Community Standards, your account will remain disabled.” A later message informed him, “We can't review this decision because too much time has passed since your account was disabled.”

A neighbor told him she got locked out because Facebook didn't think she met the minimum age requirement of 13 to open an account, even though she is almost 60. She filed appeals and sent them proof of her age, so Facebook let her open a new account, but her old postings were gone. She complained and got a message saying a response “typically takes 2 to 3 days.” That was in September 2020. Her handwritten letters did no better at getting a human response.

“Their policy is non-communication,” Rachiele says. A phone message and email to the Facebook press office explaining that this column was in the works and would be printed after 24 hours went unanswered.

Rachiele says he fears that some people will think he unfriended them, and that's why they no longer can see his posts. If he were hacked by someone who posted offensive things under his name, he couldn't alert Facebook because his account has been disabled.

Researching his options, Rachiele joined the nearly 10,000 people who have complained about Facebook, now called Meta Technology Co., on the Better Business Bureau website.

He found a lawsuit filed against Facebook seeking damages for disabling an account in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, which Facebook is seeking to have dismissed.

Because Facebook deemed he violated community standards, Rachiele also is banned from Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus and other entities purchased by Facebook. He found numerous similar stories posted online and a YouTube video from a woman in a similar situation, who eventually found success after she contacted Oculus to say she wanted to purchase new Oculus equipment and needed her Facebook account restored.

Rachiele, who has an Oculus account, says the company merely refunded his money with no offer to restore his Facebook account.

Saying he wants to warn others that this could happen to them, Rachiele doesn't expect a newspaper column to persuade Facebook to restore 13 years of his posts. But he hasn't abandoned all hope.

“It's out there,” Rachiele says of his past 13 years of Facebook posts.

“Somebody just has to turn the key and give it back.”