A 16-year-old Malaysian girl with a history of depression is believed to have committed suicide after asking her social media followers to vote on whether she should kill herself.
The girl, who was not named, ran a poll on the photo-sharing app Instagram asking “Really Important, Help Me Choose D/L,” hours before she made the decision to jump off the roof of a building in Sarawak, on the Northwest coast of Borneo.
The “D/L” meant “Death/Life,”
According to Reuters, the poll showed 69% of the girl’s followers chose ‘D’.
“We are conducting a post-mortem to determine whether there were other factors in her death,” district police Aidil Bolhassan told Reuters.
Instagram, which extended sympathy to the teenager’s family, reviewed the girl’s account and found that the online poll ended with 88% percent votes for ‘L’, according to Wong Ching Yee, head of communications for Instagram in the Asia-Pacific.
According to Aidil, the poll’s numbers could have changed after news of the girl’s death spread.
Malaysian law stipulates that anyone convicted of encouraging the suicide of a minor is subject to the death penalty or up to 20 years in jail.
