Missouri Makes Online Harassment A Felony
from the laws-passed-out-of-emotion dept
Laws passed as an emotional reaction to a tragic situation are almost always bad laws. The state of Missouri has signed into law a bill to make online harassment a felony. This is in response, of course, to the infamous "Lori Drew/Megan Meier" case that has received so much attention. Of course, when you look at the facts of the case, it's not even clear if this law would have mattered. Drew didn't set up the MySpace account to harass Meier, but to find out what she was saying about her daughter. The "harassing" messages were actually sent by another teen, and weren't meant as harassment either, but as an (extremely misguided) attempt to get Meier to stop contacting the "fake" person. It's certainly understandable that people feel that something should be done, since a young girl ended up killing herself, but rushing into laws won't necessarily fix the situation at all. Also, it needs to be asked: if the same set of facts existed, but the boy who made Meier angry was real instead of fake -- would he also have been guilty under this law? If so, a lot of angry messages between kids having silly school spats are going to be court material.![Hide This Hide this](https://ii.techdirt.com/s/t/i/topclose.png)
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Filed Under: lori drew, megan meier, missouri, online harassment
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Adding "on-line" to a crime
The technology used to harass a person should not be a factor in the existence of the crime. It may be a factor in the punishment of the guilty.
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Re: Adding "on-line" to a crime
i keep asking if the whole thing happened "offline" how what would the result be?
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Re: Adding "on-line" to a crime
The importance and newsworthiness of this 'bad law' is that it raises the penalty and effect on someone's life to be convicted of this. A felony is a very serious black mark on a person's life.
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huh?
Of course the perpetrators are going to say they weren't meant to harass because they're being charged with felonies and they want to make themselves look like fucking angels. Well I'm here to tell you that an asshole cousin of mine raped and killed a woman and now after being convicted the idiot is claiming he never made a confession(not true) and that the fact that she turned him into the cops beforehand was not in fact motivation to kill her. Yeah, right.
Lori Drew had something in mind by creating that profile and simple reconnaissance was not at the top of the list I guarantee since there were many other methods to find that out without having to go through the bother of creating all those OTHER accounts(did you forget about that, Mike?) to build her up and then eventually trash her by calling her a whore, etc. She went through a lot of trouble to talk to Megan when she could have just as likely found one of her friends and gotten the info much easier.
The messages play like a plot from a bad movie about con-men, how can you NOT see that, or that it's likely that is where they got the idea in the first place.
I've seen the worst side of most people and can safely say that Lori Drew would hang if I were on the jury.
That said, the law will definitely lead to trouble.
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Re: huh?
Phillip Garrido had something similar to say about how he was making a better world, to quote: "You're going to find the most powerful story coming from the witness, from the victim," he promised. "If you take this a step at a time, you're going to fall over backward, and in the end you're going to find the most powerful, heartwarming story." It's all just perspective or insanity, but never life affirming with respect to the other persons life.
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Shut up ehrichweiss
You don't live in Missouri, do you? If you do then I apologize. Oh wait, I don't apologize. As it turns out, Missouri doesn't have legal jurisdiction outside of Missouri, which is of course where 99.99% of Internet users reside.
I wonder how much taxpayer money will be wasted by idiots in Missouri trying to bring charges against people that Missouri can't prosecute. Or more to the point, how long it takes before someone gets the law overturned on the basis that Missouri doesn't have the legal authority to regulate inter-state communications.
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Re: Shut up ehrichweiss
a girl should not have to die for the state to change laws.
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Kevin made another good point - "As it turns out, Missouri doesn't have legal jurisdiction outside of Missouri, which is of course where 99.99% of Internet users reside."
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Re:
I doubt she can ever live this down but twenty years of self sacrifice and good behavior might help.
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Why The Opposition To This Case?
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Re: Why The Opposition To This Case?
People should not let emotions pass horribly stupid laws. No matter how good intentioned they seem, or for the cause. All this really is is some grandstanding by the politicians.
Seriously, now all 10 year olds are going to start getting lawyers because there is a school bully somewhere online being a jerk. Being a jerk is not against the law. Making being a jerk online against the law is even more dumb. It is for the emotionally weak.
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whatever happened to....
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Dumbass state
Just go to North St. Louis and you will find more problems than they have police to cover. Wonder how many murders will happen over the holiday weekend, it must not be that big of a deal.
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online harrassment
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