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Gypsy Rose calls for 'Kenan's Law' in new petition launched after fiancé Ken Urker's death
Gypsy Rose Blanchard has launched a petition to fight online harassment after the suspected overdose of her child’s father.
Ken Urker died aged 34 on October 1, after facing an “enormous amount of public scrutiny” before his death.
According to an Instagram post made by Blanchard in the days following his untimely death, Urker faced "extensive content about him that we believed crossed the line from criticism into targeted harassment and cyberbullying".
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Blanchard reported the online bullying but nothing changed
Allegedly, the couple consistently reported the content to various social media platforms, but were often told that "no violation" was found.
Blanchard, who served time in prison for facilitating her mother’s murder after a childhood of medical abuse, has since proposed a law called “Kenan’s Law”, formally described as the Online Harassment Reporting and Accountability Act, and has started a Change.org petition asking for support.
The law intends to force social-media companies to do more when someone is repeatedly targeted by harassment, particularly allowing people to report multiple posts at once in cases of an ongoing pattern of harassment, rather than allowing "every incident to be evaluated in isolation."
In the heartbreaking statement she said: "Kenan's Law is about changing the way social-media platforms handle repeated reports of harassment.
"One post viewed alone may not tell the whole story – but hundreds of posts, videos and comments directed at one person can reveal a pattern that deserves meaningful review."
The couple met while Blanchard was in prison
The ex-convict served eight years of her ten-year sentence for second-degree murder after her boyfriend at the time, Nicholas Godejohn, stabbed her mom to death.
While Blanchard was incarcerated, Urker contacted her after watching the documentary Mommy Dead and Dearest, all about the medical and psychological abuse her mom subjected her to. The pair got engaged in 2018, but broke up the following year.
Blanchard married another man, Ryan Anderson, in 2022, while still in prison, and lived with him when she was released in 2023. However, shortly after their separation, she reconnected with Urker and, in April 2024 became pregnant with their daughter.
In her Change.org petition, Blanchard said Urker "died following a suspected overdose" but said: "We do not know whether the overdose was intentional, and I will not speculate about circumstances that have not been determined."
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or visit 988lifeline.org.