BARRINGTON — Two police investigations have been opened in the aftermath of an article in the current issue of Rhode Island Monthly magazine that looks at teen drinking issues.The article, with a cover headline “Fatal Attraction: How kids, cars and drinking are tearing Barrington apart,” has sparked hundreds of reactions on the Internet, many from a new Facebook group called Boycott Rhode Island Monthly and many more on the Web site of the magazine itself, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Providence Journal.

Editor Sarah Francis said she wrote Police Chief John LaCross last week after one writer on the Facebook site suggested that the author of the story, freelance writer Gretchen Voss, should be sexually mutilated and then forced to watch her family being slowly killed. The individual suggested how to keep a body from being discovered, adding in a second post: “Remember, if there is no body there is crime.”

“Jacki you know how we wanted to kill her and harass her, well now we have someone that might actually make that happen lol. niceeeee,” reads a post by another person.( “Lol” is shorthand for “laugh out loud.”)

Those entries have been removed, but, Francis said, “This is pretty disturbing, and in a post-Columbine world you can’t take chances.”

LaCross said yesterday he plans to meet by week’s end with state police experts in Internet crime to see if the comments constitute a threat and whether police can trace the writer. The name of at least one local student in town was attached to the vanished postings.Local police are also investigating an incident last week in which vandals plastered a wall of the Primrose Hill School with the misspelled message: “Gretchen Voss, Pray for the soles of whom you report & hope that tragedy never finds your door . . .”

Francis said the article has prompted more reaction than any the magazine has published.

As of 4 p.m. yesterday, there were 30 comments on the Facebook site and 225 responses related to the article on the magazine’s Web site. Nearly all of the comments on the magazine site are anonymous or use a nickname. The Facebook comments have names.The vast majority of the comments are critical in part because the story offers heart-wrenching reminders of four fatalities that many people in town would rather not re-live. “The article is written in a sensationalized, unsympathetic manner. This is not news or good reporting or a worthy story at all. It does nothing but spread more hurt on a wounded community,” one person wrote on the Rhode Island Monthly site.

“They made all four boys look like alcoholics and bad kids, and made it seem like we don’t care that our best friends died. They like don’t have [obscenity] hearts,” according to one comment on the Facebook site. “Alcohol doesn’t kill, if it did, MOST of you talking on this comment box would be dead right now, but since you ARE NOT, then it’s pretty obvious that it doesn’t kill, am I correct? Not wearing a seat-belt and crashing the car kills, speeding on rainy nights, kills, but alcohol, doesn’t,” was another reaction.

One writer, having read the first wave of comments, responded: “As an outsider, I must say that if some of these comments are trying to paint a different picture of the town than the article painted, you’re not doing a very good job. You’re all kind of coming across as a bunch of whiners.”

Some reactions were more moderate. “My first question when I read this article was why was it written? We know Barrington has a problem so let’s stop pointing that out. It’s time to figure out a solution. In order for that to happen, Barrington needs to act as a community. There needs to be communication among everyone (sorry guys, but including law enforcement),” said a Facebook commentator.

Chief LaCross said he was concerned because, by highlighting the strong differences of opinion in town so starkly, it becomes harder to bring people together to solve the problem.

Comments supporting the article or its conclusions are often followed by attacks on those authors, with many of the writers harshly attributing the supportive comments to Meg Jones, the mother of a high school student who has passionately — critics would say fanatically — opposed underage drinking in town. Jones said yesterday she is not the author of any of the comments.

Some people interviewed by Voss assert that they were misled about the intent of the article. Kathleen Sullivan, town’s substance abuse task force coordinator, said she was told that the story would be about alcohol problems statewide and what Barrington is doing to deal with its issues.

Francis said the intent of the article was not misrepresented.

“We live here, too, and were trying to find out what’s going in this town. We said the problem of underage drinking is not unique to Barrington. It happens in every town practically in the country and we said that in the story,” she said. “But for whatever reason, Barrington has been in the news a number of times in the last few years. So if you’re going to use an example, it’s the first one that comes to mind.”

The article contained several elements that sparked attacks against the magazine, such as Voss’ description of how Barrington teens have reacted to the deaths. “Surprisingly casual sympathy notes posted on the website Facebook suggest the teens are in denial,” she wrote.“Who are you to judge our pain?” one person responded. “You have no idea how people feel or what they’ve been through.”

Some commentators were offended to read in the magazine article that one high school student, Bianca Jones-Pearson, Meg Jones’ daughter, and her friends refer to classmates who drink as “Murderers, Inc.” and the article’s reference that Barrington has a “Group of Twenty,” consisting of parents who allow their children and their friends to drink and smoke pot in their houses.

“There is no such group as the 20. It is a myth made up by Meg Jones,” said one commentator on the Rhode Island Monthly site.

Francis said yesterday that Voss was given the names of parents who are reportedly in the group. “We made an effort to contact these people,” the editor said. None returned calls.

Francis also said the interviews were taped and the story was fact-checked. “We were very careful.”

The end of the article refers to a Dec. 29 incident at Colt State Park where a 17-year-old Barrington High School student struck a passerby after a trying to elude a police officer. It describes the youth as “drunk and stoned.”

The teen had blood alcohol levels of .035 and .033 on two separate tests, which is below the legal limit of .08 for driving while intoxicated, but above the limit for driving while impaired as a juvenile. A charge of marijuana possession was dropped.

Said Francis: “We have to look into that because it’s an evolving story. We would have to look at the timing before I feel I could comment on that.”

Voss, contacted by e-mail, said yesterday she has not kept up with the reaction and had no comment.

gemery@projo.com