Photographer: Gabby Jones / Bloomberg
Photographer: Gabby Jones / Bloomberg
The chief executive officer of Parler LLC says he has gone into hiding after death threats.
John Matze Jr.’s social media platform was briefly the new home for conservative supporters of Donald Trump who flocked to it after Twitter banned the president. But Parler went dark on Sunday after Apple Inc. and Google had removed it from their app stores and Amazon.com Inc. pulled the plug on its web hosting service, citing violent content that the e-commerce giant said played in the Capitol riot on Jan. 6.
“Many Parler employees suffer intimidation and hostility, fear for their safety and that of their families, and in some cases have fled their home states to escape prosecution,” said Matze’s attorney in Parler’s lawsuit aimed at coercing Amazon. Web Services to bring the platform back online. Matze had to go into hiding with his family after receiving death threats and invasive personal security breaches. The CEO has not specified the source of the threats, but his attorney said in a filing that Matze’s covert action was required because he was in the spotlight “as the CEO of the company continues to slander AWS.”
Matze’s move comes after Amazon said earlier this week that its employees have been too endangered – by Parler users. “Both sides of this dispute have shown that their employees have suffered real harassment and threats – including death threats on both sides – because of the accused nature of this lawsuit,” said Parler’s filing, previously reported by Fox News.
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