On November 28, 2018, the Richland, Washington, Police Department published a wanted notice for Anthony Akers on Facebook. The post stated that the Department of Corrections wanted him for failure to comply. What followed turned a routine appeal for information into an unusual public conversation: Akers replied to the notice himself.Richland Police Department on Facebook
The department announced that they were looking for Anthony Akers for failure to comply, and, before they knew it, Akers had responded to their post.
Akers, described in the 2018 notice as 38, said that he was going to turn himself in. The department even replied with their business hours to be accommodating. On top of that, they offered Akers a ride to the station if he needed one.
But, the man admitted he could not turn himself in just yet—he had to “tie up a couple of loose ends.” He left the department still wondering where he was.
Akers continued replying, and the police account adopted the language of a conversation in which one person is waiting for the other to show up. The exchange drew attention for its unexpectedly conversational tone.
Eventually, though, Akers did turn himself in.
A wanted notice is not a conviction
The notice describes what authorities were seeking in November 2018. Turning himself in and the resolution of the underlying case are separate events, and the old post does not establish Akers’s present legal status. There is also a later chapter: in May 2021, KOMO News reported on his graduation from a Veterans Court programme. That follow-up shifts the focus from a viral exchange to changes in his life after the messages that first attracted public attention.
The official notice acquires an unexpected reply thread
Akers’s responses turn a one-way wanted notice into a public conversation about his stated intention to attend the station. The police account’s replies, including the offer of transport, give the exchange its unusual tone. His eventual arrival at the station gives the exchange an ending, while the later reporting shows why the screenshots should not stand in for a whole biography. The humour rests in the timing and wording of the replies. It does not require treating an old wanted notice as a permanent description of the person.
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