Slashdot Log In
Lori Drew Trial Results In 3 Misdemeanor Convictions
Posted by
timothy
on Wed Nov 26, 2008 05:11 PM
from the justice-or-not dept.
from the justice-or-not dept.
grassy_knoll writes "As a follow up to an earlier story, the Lori Drew 'cyber-bullying' trial has resulted in misdemeanor convictions." grassy_knoll quotes from the AP story as carried by Salon: "The Los Angeles federal court jury on Wednesday rejected felony charges of accessing a computer without authorization to inflict emotional distress on young Megan Meier.
However, the jury found defendant Lori Drew guilty of three counts of the lesser offense of accessing a computer without authorization.
The jurors could not reach a verdict on a conspiracy count.
Prosecutors said Drew violated the MySpace terms of service by conspiring with her young daughter and a business assistant to create a fictitious profile of a teen boy on the MySpace social networking site to harass Megan.
Megan, who had been treated for depression, hanged herself in 2006 after receiving a message saying the world would be better without her."
Adds reader gillbates: "She now faces up to 3 years in jail and $300,000 in fines — a troubling precedent for anyone who has ever registered with a website under a pseudonym."
Related Stories
[+]
News: Lori Drew Cyber-Bullying Trial Begins 317 comments
An anonymous reader writes "The cyber-bullying trial of Lori Drew opened yesterday. She was indicted for conspiring to access and accessing MySpace illegally in order to 'further a tortious act, namely, intentional infliction of emotional distress' (PDF of the indictment). The BBC has background on the case, the NYTimes covers the opening statements, and Wired has today's testimony."
[+]
News: Groklaw Summarizes the Lori Drew Verdict 457 comments
Bootsy Collins writes "Last Wednesday, the Lori Drew 'cyberbullying' case ended in three misdemeanor convictions under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, a 1986 US Federal law intended to address illegally accessing computer systems. The interpretation of the act by the Court to cover violations of website terms of service, a circumstance obviously not considered in the law's formulation and passage, may have profound effects on the intersection of the Internet and US law. Referring to an amicus curiae brief filed by online rights organizations and law professors, PJ at Groklaw breaks down the implications of the decision to support her assertion that 'unless this case is overturned, it is time to get off the Internet completely, because it will have become too risky to use a computer.'"
[+]
Judge Tentatively Dismisses Case Against Lori Drew 420 comments
An anonymous reader writes "According to Wired, 'A federal judge on Thursday overturned guilty verdicts against Lori Drew, and issued a directed acquittal on the three misdemeanor charges.'" A similar story in the L.A. Times notes that "The decision by US District Judge George H. Wu will not become final until his written ruling is filed, probably next week." Update: 07/02 21:15 GMT by T : For those not following, Lori Drew's three convictions sprang from charges of online harassment of Megan Meier, a Missouri teenager whose suicide was linked to Drew's actions.
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
Shit (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Shit (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, but, that is not against the law...if it were, well, the prisons would be bursting at the seams even moreso than they do now..
I hope this gets tossed out on appeal. While what she did was reprehensible, this sets a dangerous precedent. You can get a misdemeanor conviction with jail time and heft fine just for joining something like myspace under false name, etc?
Even if you think she is a bitch and should get some punishment for what she did....I'd hope you would not like to have a precedent of this type of conviction that could be used against someone doing something as innocuous as joining a website under a false name....
Parent
Re:Shit (Score:5, Insightful)
how so? i register on websites with pseudonyms all the time. this does not trouble me at all (other than the fact a grown woman would conspire with her daughter to bully a neighbor's kid, especially a young girl with emotional problems).
the problem isn't with the interpretation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act in this particular case. the problem is with the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act [wikipedia.org] itself. this incident actually resulted in the death of a girl and was motivated by deliberate malice. a maximum (which are rarely handed out to members of privileged social groups) of 3 years in jail and $300,000 doesn't seem any more ridiculous than handing out such punishments to well-intending security experts [cnet.com].
i would be more disturbed by the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act being applied to non-malicious teenage hackers breaking into un-secured government networks out of curiosity. if they can be faulted for "damages" that include the time spent investigating the intrusion and fixing the pre-existing security flaws, then certainly a grown woman can be punished for causing the death of a little girl.
in any case, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act needs major reforms, and perhaps making such ridiculous laws applicable to the general population will open people's eyes.
Parent
Re:Shit (Score:5, Funny)
Oh YOU'RE the extra pickles guy.
I always get your damn burger after I've ordered no pickles. Dammit.
Parent
Re:Shit (Score:5, Insightful)
Herein lies the problem with the American way of life. If someone is an asshole to you they KNOW that you cant reach over and smack them in the face.
It's why these jerks on the highways and roads, tailgaite you, cut you off, and generally put your life in danger for their convenience. If they knew that I would stop my car and kick their ass, they would not do it.
Honestly a lot of people in his world need to be smacked in the head, all the way to having the ever living crap beat out of them. If that happened more and Judges had 1/4 a brain and said," you deserved to be smacked.. you cover all court costs and his costs as well." Then the world would be far more polite and less jerkwad filled.
Yes that applies to cops too.. if a cop is an asshole, we deserve to be able to wait for him after work and kick his ass.
Parent
Re:Shit (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Somewhat fitting. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think that putting her away for life is appropriate, let alone the death penalty.
That being said, I also don't like the idea of an adult conspiring to harass an emotionally unstable child (aren't they all).
This is a good decision, so long as it is upheld. 300K fine and a (relatively) short jail term is enough to ruin a life for anyone not upper class, and will likely act as a deterrent to others that think that conspiring to harass someone online is just fun and games.
Now mod me to oblivion.
Re:Somewhat fitting. (Score:5, Informative)
True. But where were her parents? Pretty sad the girl lived in a household where she couldn't talk to her folks about what was going on.
I'm usually on the side of parents taking responsibility for the welfare of their children. It bothers me to no end when parents seem to think others should assume that responsibility. However, I'm not so sure this is one of those situations.
From the Wired blog [wired.com]:
Then on October 15, Josh sent Megan a message saying that he didn't want to be friends anymore. The next day, Josh told her he'd heard she wasn't nice to her friends, and that's why he wanted to sever their ties.
Megan became upset and Meier, who had to leave the house to take her other daughter to an orthodontist appointment, told Megan to shut down the computer. Megan didn't do as she was told, however, and got embroiled in an electronic brawl when at least two other people began attacking her online, culminating in the final message from "Josh".
When Meier came home she found Megan still online and in tears. When she appealed to her mother for support, Meier chastised her for being on the computer when she'd been instructed to shut it down, and suggested that Megan had brought some of the attacks on herself by continuing to communicate with her attackers.
Megan, in mental anguish at this point, told her mother, "You're supposed to be my mom. You're supposed to be on my side."
Thirty minutes later, Megan hanged herself, Meier testified.
I'm sure the mother wishes she could have had that moment back; handled it differently. However, this certainly doesn't seem like a case of an inattentive parent who didn't communicate with their children.
Parent
I'm not troubled... (Score:5, Insightful)
"She now faces up to 3 years in jail and $300,000 in fines - a troubling precedent for anyone who has ever registered with a website under a pseudonym."
I'm not actually troubled much by this at all. This is what happens to someone who falsifies their information to use an online service TO A BAD END.
That's actually a good precedent.
Can it be warped? Sure, but so can everything else. I personally feel that three misdemeanor convictions are a PERFECT fit for what happened, and would like to see similar charges brought against future 'cyber bullies' going forward with similar results. The penalties sound a bit harsh, but I'm sure they will be whittled to 90 days in a white-collar work camp, just as they were for the 'Spam King'.
Re:I'm not troubled... (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed, there's going to be a lot of outrage that she wasn't convicted of more serious offences, but there's a limited scope to what can be done to her.
If you make it too severe, then in similar cases where the defendant is totally innocent, you're going to have problems.
This is much like the attempt to reclassify downloading music and movies as a felony. Is it against the law? Yes. Is it a crime equal to grand theft auto or murder? No.
What this woman did was cowardly, stupid, abhorrent and vindictive, and almost certainly led the young girl to kill herself due to being bullied and psychologically manipulated by a grown (physically) but immature (mentally) woman who should really know better.
There is possibly a case for manslaughter, but in that case, you'd likely have to prove that the nasty cunt set out to kill Megan, instead of just set out to bully her, and you run the risk of her being acquitted.
Perhaps one day she'll feel guilty for killing a child, but the law and justice system just isn't set up to put her away for that, at least not without endangering the system itself.
Parent
Re:I'm not troubled... (Score:5, Insightful)
What if it were a real teenaged boy who used his real name and information and he harassed the girl and drove her to suicide? To me, the falsification of information seems irrelevant.
Parent
Re:I'm not troubled... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not actually troubled much by this at all. This is what happens to someone who falsifies their information to use an online service TO A BAD END.
Thank goodness it's the government who will decide what a "bad end" means!
Parent
What Pisses Me Off... (Score:5, Interesting)
is that Ashley Grills, who wrote the actual message about the world being better off without Megan Meier, had immunity protection from being prosecuted, for testifying against Lori Drew! This woman is just as evil as Lori Drew, and should be punished as well!
The biggest WTF (Score:5, Insightful)
...to me is that it seems the only thing she was really convicted of was "accessing a computer without authorization". Does that mean that if we talked over IRC or some P2P chat or sent an e-mail or whatever where you didn't explicitly agree to a ToS regarding the service, that this would be completely legal? Because if that's the case, it's an absurd penalty for breaking a ToS and pretty wierd that there's no other law to deal with somebody harassing a kid to death. Or maybe I'm completely misreading this?
Makes no sense (Score:5, Insightful)
Am I the only one who cannot understand why they went this stupid direction rather than processing using a relevent law. (Yes I know they said they they could not find any law applicable...)
To me this seems just as bad as when some companyt slaps "on the internet" onto some existing thing and try to patent it/otherwise claim control over it.
Surely mental torture is covered by an existing law. "On the internet" is neither here nor there.
Maybe it's just me but I'm sick of this "on the internet" bollocks.
Re:Say what? (Score:5, Insightful)
If she was guilty of psychological stalking (which she was) she should have been charged with stalking. This is a clear misapplication of the law.
Parent
Re:Say what? (Score:5, Insightful)
a troubling precedent for anyone who has ever registered with a website under a pseudonym.
This has nothing to do with registering under a pseudonym. This has to do with psychological stalking and trauma. Please pull your head out of your ass. I'm sure it's hard to breathe up there.
The take home is, victimizing someone is bad. That it happened via the internet means they've had to fudge things up a bit, but I don't think this means flaming someone on a website means the cops will come-a-calling.
In this instance the woman was clearly a nasty piece of work, so I'm glad they found a way to punish her. I would not expect someone posting nastiness here would get into trouble with anyone except the mods.
I think some people make the mistake of assuming that things done on the internet which would result in fines or punishment in the real world are somehow 'freedoms that need defending' on the web. I'm not one of those people.
I don't mind argument, rudeness, flaming, or anything like that, I mean, that I just accept as background noise, but this incident went way beyond anything like of that nature.
Parent
Re:It's far more troubling... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, but it's not "murder". It was a terrible thing that she did and she should be punished for it, but it was not actually murder.
In any case, we live under the rule of law. And one consequence of that is that sometimes people do terrible things that are not covered by the law. In that case, these people should go free. It's terrible, but it's vastly superior to the anarchy that results when there is no rule of law.
Parent
Re:It's far more troubling... (Score:5, Insightful)
All that means is that the law is wrong. Goading someone into killing themselves is murder.
I have no idea why you brought up anarchy. I am advocating that we change our Justice system to actually mete out justice. That doesn't sound like anarchy to me.
It is not justice to allow a murderer to go free. Technicalities are not justice.
In your world, pushing someone off a cliff is OK because you didn't kill them. After all, is it your fault they hit the ground?
Parent
Re:It's far more troubling... (Score:5, Insightful)
Would you argue that she should be punished even if the young girl had just shrugged it off and got on with her life?
The punishment should be based on an act, not on somebody's reaction to that act. Either an action 'ABC' is a crime or it is not - that should not depend on someone's reaction to 'ABC'.
Parent
Re:It's far more troubling... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's an interesting interpretation of the law or morality but I don't think you'll find that it matches the real world even a little bit.
Forget to feed your baby and he cries a lot and shrugs it off: no consequences.
Forget to feed your baby and he dies: you go to prison for a very long time.
Go 25MPH over the speed limit and get caught by a cop: expensive speeding ticket.
Go 25MPH over the speed limit and kill a van full of girl scouts: you go to prison for a very long time.
Plan to kill somebody and screw it up: go to prison for a little while.
Plan to kill somebody and succeed: get the chair.
Need I go on? Outcomes matter.
Parent
Re:let this be a warning... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, put it this way. If I tell you I'm a doctor and that you're terminally ill and that you'll die in horrible pain pretty soon, and based upon that believe you shoot yourself in the head, it's a suicide but it was induced by deception.
-jcr
Parent
Re:let this be a warning... (Score:5, Informative)
Still...is that against the law??
I'm not sure. I know some countries have laws against inducement to suicide, I'd have to ask an attorney whether any US states do.
Seems to me that justice would have been better served here if someone had just beaten the crap out of Lori Drew, and gotten acquitted for it due to extenuating circumstances.
-jcr
Parent
Re:Precedent (Score:5, Funny)
Owning a crowbar is not a crime. Using it to bash in the skull of your neighbor is a major felony. Likewise, it isn't illegal to have a pseudonym.
But using your pseudonym to bash in the skull of your neighbor is a major no no.
Parent
Role of SSRI anti-depressants? (Score:5, Interesting)
According to wikipedia [wikipedia.org] Meier was taking Celexa, Concerta, and Geodon.
Celexa is an SSRI anti-depressant medication. SSRI meds are associated with the following side effects:
Manic Reaction (Mania, e.g., Kleptomania, Pyromania, Dipsomania)
Abnormal Thinking
Hallucinations
Personality Disorder
Amnesia
Agitation
Psychosis
Abnormal Dreams
Emotional Lability (Or Instability)
Alcohol Abuse and/or Craving
Hostility
Paranoid Reactions
Confusion
Delusions
Sleep Disorders
Akathisia (Severe Inner Restlessness)
Discontinuation (Withdrawal) Syndrome
On September 14, 2004 the FDA added a Black Box Warning in regard to antidepressants & suicidality in those under age 18
http://www.fda.gov/ohrms/dockets/ac/04/slides/2004-4065s2.htm [fda.gov]
On September 14, 2004 the FDA mandated that pharmacies provide to all parents or guardians for those younger than 18 an Antidepressant Patient Medication Guide. This guide reads (in part) "Call healthcare provider right away if you or your family member has any of the following symptoms: Acting aggressive, being angry, or violent & acting on dangerous impulses." This Antidepressant Patient Medication Guide also states "Never stop an antidepressant medicine without first talking to a healthcare provider. Stopping an antidepressant medicine suddenly can cause other symptoms."
On December 13, 2006, the Black Box Warning for suicidality was updated to include those under age 25. The Black Box Warning is included in the insert to the drugs and in the Physicians' Desk reference.
Note how Meier was also taking Geodon, which is used for schizophrenia, acute mania, and mixed episodes associated with bipolar disorder. She was clearly being affected negatively by the anti-depressant Celexa. Instead of taking her off the medication her doctors gave her more medication!
The role that these drugs played in the suicide of this poor girl haven't been investigated. That doesn't excuse the behavior of the women, but does it warrant jail time and a large fine? Shouldn't her parents, doctors and FDA officials, pharma companies also be liable for putting her on these meds?
Parent