I got an inbox message on Facebook around eight o’clock Monday night from a “named source” in Florida. My named source was Ronnie Lauer. Ronnie’s a kid I grew up with who now lives in Florida – although neither Ronnie nor I are kids anymore.

I hopped online and quickly verified the story – Fox4 News in Fort Myers was reporting that Fort Myers P.D. had indeed arrested Nate Allen Monday afternoon – but police were withholding details of the arrest.

I posted a quick hit on Twitter.

I tweeted Marc Farzetta, hoping he was doing the updates on WIP. Marc verified the story and posted it on Twitter as well.

His tweet got instant responses – some were chucklers.

Meanwhile, Matt Lombardo and Joe Staszak were breaking the news about Nate Allen’s arrest on The Fanatic. Oh, yeah, I was listening to them when Ronnie Lauer messaged me, so I’d also tweeted the news to Matt.

Matt made phone calls to both the FMPD and Nate Allen.

He struck out with FMPD because it was President’s Day and the offices were closed. They didn’t expect a return call from Nate Allen under the circumstances.

And next thing I knew, the story’s all over Twitter – but still no details about why Nate Allen was arrested.

Well, somewhere along the line, Howard Eskin picked up the story and started digging – and  you know how Howard loves to dig.

A couple hours passed and Howard started getting to the bottom of things.

– First, Nate Allen was arrested on Monday afternoon, but it was unlikely he’d be charged with anything.

–  Next, a girl accused Allen of exposing himself, to her, in his truck, and Allen was detained for questioning.

– And, finally–

Bottom line: It now appears that Nate Allen was wrongly accused of exposing himself; he was arrested, or detained, for questioning; and he was released when his accuser admitted she was lying.

So much ado about nothing in a short period of time and an innocent man’s name was besmirched.

Social media is something else.

Barry Bowe is the author of Born to Be Wild and 1964 – The Year the Phillies Blew the Pennant.