Social Networking Sites Becoming Useful For Lawyers 353
chareverie writes "With how the internet has become, social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace have become a tool for crime solvers, employers, and now, lawyers. Two weeks after Joshua Lipton was charged in a drunk driving case, the college junior attended a Halloween party dressed as a prisoner, with the words 'jail bird' on his costume. Not surprisingly, his prosecutor was able to obtain photos of him at the party that were posted on Facebook, and claimed he was an 'unrepentant partier who lived it up while his victim recovered in the hospital.' The photos were presented in a slideshow, with one of them showing Lipton holding a can of Red Bull in one hand, and an arm draped around a girl bearing sorority letters. The judge agreed with the prosecutor, and changed Lipton's sentence to two years in prison. The article also cites other instances of people getting harsher sentences from pictures of them posted online."
This was just on the news in Philly (Score:5, Interesting)
Last week some 18 year-old punk was speeding and hit two women who were in town from St. Louis to see the Cardinals play the Phillies. One of them later died.
The cops found his MySpace page, and it's apparently full of pics of him drinking and smoking pot, and the article even says he used a mugshot from a prior arrest as his default photo. The cops got wind of it and snagged his computer and other stuff from his house with a search warrant, and they'll probably use it to stave off any attempt at the "but he's a good boy who just made a mistake" defense.
After reading the article [philly.com], I am completely disgusted... especially with his parents, under whose noses it seems much of his bad behavior has been going on. Call me old-fashioned, but I think parents should try to raise their kids to, you know, not be a colossal fuckup.
The best part, IMHO, is that for all his "I'm just Mr. Buster Badass" posturing on his MySpace page, he is apparently throwing up in jail because he's so scared (insert derisive Nelson Muntz laugh here).
~Philly
Re:Wrong title (Score:2, Interesting)
It's not that I don't agree with what you say, but taking your same line of reasoning I can say..
"The methods this prosecutor used is a method any...." doctor, superintendent, boss, government worker, mom, dad, grandpa, etc person of authority "use".
This article is about this particular situation, not about lawyers in general.
Oh, Bravo! (Score:3, Interesting)
This is correct use of technology- hands down, a winning proposition.
Now, it may not be so when prosecutors dredge up photos unrelated to, older, than, or from a different person with the same name, so this only argues for more transparent ways for hosts, services, and users to find unshakeable ways to authenticate what happens under their aegis. opt-in automatic encrypted transmission watermarks, anyone?
responsibility, what a concept!
(or learn 2 anon, use 7 proxies, etc)
Re:He does look like a jail bird (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:This is Stupid (Score:4, Interesting)
No, it isn't. See http://archives.cnn.com/2000/LAW/05/04/civil.rights/index.html [cnn.com] and http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2006/01/should_criminal.html [typepad.com] for starters.
lousy defence lawyer (Score:5, Interesting)
So what we have is a guy who was known for drinking alcoholic beverages, now drinks non-alcoholic Red Bull instead. Any lawyer worth his or her fee, would've pointed out this evidenced change in behaviour as a sign that the subject no longer drank, and therefore should have a reduced sentence.
It's all down to the interpretation.
Re:This is Stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
George W. Bush does coke, gets arrested, gets a new [fortunecity.com] drivers' license [answerbag.com] number "000000005" to hide the arrest [realchange.org], gets a bunch more DUIs ... and hasn't done any jail time yet.
If he were black?
This will continue to occur (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:This is Stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
Well, I did a google search, and in a few moments found such work. (Remove references to Conrad Black -- most results have cites to the original sources.)
This sort of thing saddens me. People actually think that the US has become entirely color-blind? And, Slashdotters aren't able to do google searches?
And I've personal experience with this too. I was on the jury of a murder case. It was astounding how often certain other jurers brought up race. For instance, apparently, all black men come "from the same place" and can tell each other apart perfectly!
Re:This is Stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
Obama admitted to doing drugs, and he's not going to jail.
Yet, once he's president, he'll have the official capacity to pardon all non-violent drug offenders... think he'll do it???
We warn kids about this all the time... (Score:5, Interesting)
When kids get their room assignments, they instantly check their roommates out on facebook. Every now and then we hear stories that even before they've met the roommate, parents ask for a new one because the roommate's facebook page makes them worry the kid might be gay.
Re:Good? (Score:3, Interesting)
This isn't about privacy. There was no attempt at privacy here.
Anyone feeling threatened by this should up their agoraphobia medicine. Either that, or you should educate yourself in the difference between public and private. Just because you had the false impression that your myspace page was private doesn't make it so.
Newsflash, the exterior of your home is also publicly visible. Hanging a billboard sized child pron poster on it will get you landed in jail, and no amount of "but I didn't think the police would be able to see it there" denial will help you.
Re:Red Bull (Score:3, Interesting)
Speaking as someone who got run over by a Ford Explorer driven by a drooling idiot, I bet you'd feel quite differently if this dumbass had put your stupid ass in the hospital.
The most miserable part of going through months of surgeries and rehab to try to put your life back together is knowing that the jackass that hit you isn't even sorry about it. I got a year of misery and she got a new car.
When he gets out of prison, he should have to take care of her lawn and clean her house once a week for the next 20 years. Every time he doesn't perform the work to her satisfaction, it's another week in jail.
You can take that Red Bull and shove it. I don't give a shit what he was drinking. Putting on that costume and making a joke out of the misery he caused would have gotten him five to ten if I were a judge.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This was just on the news in Philly (Score:2, Interesting)
Sorry .. collecting from public sites is considered hearsay.. as anyone could take and manipulate an image before posting it. By taking the the computer the prosecutor was simply trying to verify that the pictures did come from the defendant.
Now the question is really.. on what grounds did the judge grant the warrant....
Re:Uh? Hello? (Score:1, Interesting)
SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.
Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built upon the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him, out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.Thomas Paine, Common Sense
Overzealous laws and punishments can easily become tools of revenge, look to the overapplication of the sex offender laws for example. MADD and others have been trying to move DUI etc convictions in that direction for years. While not trying to defend the subject of this case, age restrictions, time of sales regulations and limits on blood alchohol levels are a bit absurd in the US. We need to monitor and seek to control our laws and their application to maintain balance between the patron and the punisher for as Thomas Paine said we furnish the means by which we suffer.
I'm really puzzled, still (Score:3, Interesting)
"The best part is why have Facebook and MySpace so even those of us without the brainpower to use even the simplest of markup can easily show off for the entire world what kinda of asshats we can be when we really try."
I still don't get why people even use facebook (or any social sites). Near as I can tell, it's a vestige of the adolescent misconception that you are the center of the universe and everything you do is interesting and important.
Perhaps that's not fair. It persists well into adulthood as well.
The fact that everything people do and say online lives forever and will affect you for the rest of your life seems to have not sunk in with many people. I'm glad my adolescence and early adulthood are long gone and forgotten by everyone. I can't imagine trying to explain what I did 30+ years later when I was in my mid teens.
I'm assuming this whole thing is like the hula hoop. Seemed like a good idea for a while, and then we threw them out in the late 60's.
Re:Way to be logical... (Score:5, Interesting)
"First of all, he was drinking Red Bull, which is non-alcoholic, and while he was at a party I'd be thinking he'd be excited to be alive. Just me though."
First off, it was after he was already convicted, he was simply awaiting sentencing. So basically he was making light of his potential fate, one he probably doubted he'd get.
Second, according to TFA, Douchebag captioned said photo "Remorseful?" So, again, making light of his conviction and his pending probation (or so he thought).
"The other cases in the article are just as bad. A lady at a party drinking wine after a car accident? Wine just screams alcoholic!"
A car accident in which she was the driver and she killed her passenger. Drinking and joking about it while awaiting sentencing for drunk driving, after having killed somebody, suggests someone that hasn't quite grasped the gravity of brutally killing someone sitting not two feet away from you.
"The prosecution is saying she should be in AA? They know that she's an Alcoholic and didn't just make a bad choice? She's no longer aloud to drink anymore because of a bad choice?"
One in which she killed somebody.
"AA doesn't teach you to act correctly when you drink, it tried to get you to stop drinking completely"
Not that bad of an idea considering the fact that she killed someone and still saw to make light of it.
"Not to say I don't think they deserved it but expecting people to become inhuman because of an accident is just plain stupid."
How about ceasing the activity that previously lead to someone's death? Is that too much to expect? At least during the sentencing phase?
"A guy drinking red bull is a good example of just how RANDOM these pictures can be and yet they are grounds for upping a sentence?"
In a picture that the guy himself captioned as "Remorseful?" He was busily, actively, and consciously flaunting the fact that he wasn't remorseful, one of the conditions he would have needed to satisfy if he were going to to get away with probation.
Seriously, did you read the same linked article as I did?
Re:lousy defence lawyer (Score:4, Interesting)
"now drinks non-alcoholic Red Bull instead."
In a picture that he himself posted with "Remorseful?" as a caption. This was while awaiting sentencing, during which the court would like to know how much remorse he has. It's not so much that he was drinking Red Bull, but that he did so in a party, in a mock prison jumpsuit, with his free arm around sorority tail, consciously and deliberately yukking it up over the fact that he'd be facing his sentencing for his DUI conviction soon and that he wasn't half as remorseful as he was going to be telling the court.
It's not "ZOMG, he's got a canned beverage!" it's "ZOMG, his lawyer told him that he'll probably get away with probation and a slap on the wrist if he just shows up wearing a tie and says 'your honor' a lot!"
Re:This is Stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
There really isn't any reason why one that is drunk or under the influence of drugs, should be sitting at the wheel.
I think you will find there is very little reason involved in such senseless crimes. DUI punishment is already pretty severe, yet people still do it, probably because they are drunk and can't reason.
Then again, even very smart and reasonable people still commit pretty dumb crimes which are already punished by death (Re: Hans Reiser)
Re:This is Stupid (Score:1, Interesting)
Human Rights Watch is widely respected and aggressively non-partisan.
If you're a Leftist or, at the very least, are pro-abortion and pro-LGBT.
If you're a Conservative, well, ....
frankly, it's difficult for any reasonably intelligent observer
Yep. That about finishes my sentence.
Re:This was just on the news in Philly (Score:3, Interesting)
I think you took the parent much too seriously. At least, I hope you took the parent much too seriously; my impression was that it was made in jest, and not respective of the parent's true positions.
Now -- I'm putting my 20-something Libertarian hat on for the rest of this post, as I think that (of all those I wear) it's most relevant.
Personal responsibility is a Good Thing; it's only when the mechanism of state is used to enforce one particular view of what "personal responsibility" entails that there come problems. The Golden Rule isn't going anywhere -- people can understand that things they don't want others to do to them shouldn't be encouraged, and that they shouldn't do such things themselves. It's principally victimless crimes which we consider outdated -- and only inasmuch as they are considered criminal, not necessarily to the extent that they're considered good ideas: I may not want the police to be breaking down doors to arrest potheads, but there's no way in hell I want my kids toking up on a regular basis (and I'm not going to set a bad example for them -- or, at present, harm my focus on my career -- by doing so myself); while I may not teach them "right from wrong" in exactly the same way you would, there's no way I'd be a good parent if I didn't teach that actions have consequences, and that those consequences are important, and thus that intelligent people just Don't Do Certain Things. The folks in my social group who are having kids have cleaned up parts of their lives that would otherwise have set a bad example -- so again, when it becomes important, we tend to do the right thing.
So -- don't worry. The generation after you might see things a little differently, but we're not (by and large) the raving irresponsible asshats like the those discussed in this story, and we don't like those people either. We'll figure things out -- your parents were worried about your generation too, and you turned out all right... right?
Re:Uh? Hello? (Score:4, Interesting)
We're judging people now because of character instead of actions? If so, some politicians should be shitting their pants right now.
Who gets to define "moral" behaviour? You? Me? Some thinkofthechildren goon in Washington? Personally, I'd be shitting my pants now if it was the latter.
What I want him to be, or what I want him to suffer like, is not important. That's what sets a legal system apart from mob rule. There is a very good reason that not the person who was wronged gets to decide on the punishment but why we have a legal code defining that.
Does it change the state his victim is in when he mourns and cries? No. Does his victim gain anything out of him avoiding parties? No. So what is this about? Revenge? He must not enjoy his life because he made someone miserable?
By that logic, some company execs should never party again. Ever.
Re:Idiotic argument (Score:1, Interesting)
Hah! That sounds great in theory, but do you think this guy will be rehabilitated from serving 2 years in prison? NO!
His life is completely ruined. He won't be able to find a job, he won't complete his studied. He became a detriment to society.
Justice indeed!
Re:We warn kids about this all the time... (Score:3, Interesting)
parents ask for a new one because the roommate's facebook page makes them worry the kid might be gay.
So Facebook is helping (potentially) gay students avoid having to room with bigots? Wonderful!
Photos tell facts better than context (Score:3, Interesting)
In general I don't have a problem of using extra sources of information like Facebook. What I find disturbing about this is that the judge's decision was influenced, even according to the judge, by photos that someone else posted to facebook. From what I can tell that photographer was never cross-examined to establish the actual context of the photograph. For all we know, someone who didn't like the guy might have coerced him into a non-representative situation for a moment so they could snap the photo to put on Facebook, then tag him in the photo to make it easy for any prosecuting lawyer to stumble upon.
Was he dragged to a party by friends to take his mind of things after 2 weeks of hell? Who else was there? Were they all close friends, and were they the sorts of people who'd try to embarrass him for his mistake? Well I hope the courts investigated that properly. Perhaps he did deserve what he got in this case, but if it's as easy to influence a judge as this article implies, it concerns me.