Spying School District Pays Out $610,000 To Settle Lawsuit -- Mostly To The Lawyers
from the legal-fees dept
We've been following the case in suburban Philadelphia of the Lower Merion School District, which was sued by a student for spying on the student in his home with district issued laptops (the kid was disciplined for supposedly using drugs, with the evidence being a photo of him in his room at his laptop -- the kid claims he was just eating Mike & Ikes candy). While the district initially denied it was spying on students, later reports found 58,000 images were taken, including 469 of another student who also sued.While the feds declined to bring criminal charges, it looks like the school district has now settled the outstanding lawsuits mainly by giving the lawyers a big chunk of money. In total, the school district paid out $610,000, with $425,000 going to the lawyers. The student who brought the first case will get $175,000, and the student in the second case will get $10,000 (the article mistakenly suggests two separate payments of $185,000, but I believe that's wrong). The district, in its announcement admits that, in total, this whole thing is costing about $1.2 million, which is actually being covered by insurance.
The situation is a bit tricky, because, in some sense, taxpayers are footing the bill for the district's ridiculous policy choices (even though insurance is covering the direct cost). I would imagine that this sort of thing will act as a reasonable deterrent to other school districts considering (or already using) similar technology.
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Filed Under: lower merion school district, schools, settlements, spying
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Adults spying on and secretly taking photos of teens? No time.
The guy who leaked a track from Chinese Democracy? In jail in two days.
Ahh, priorities...
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God I hope so
Hopefully everyone involved at the School District gets fired. But I fear the outcome will be "Ah, well, its just tax money, who gives a flying f*ck?"
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Re: God I hope so
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Re: Re: God I hope so
Then again that case might be an outlier.
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debate
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Gee, guess so. Some of those kids should have claimed they were gay and turned it into a hate crime.
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Hello?
No padding the bill there...
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Re: Hello?
Why do Lawyers get so damned much money?
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No one else seems to want to bother.
Really, this should have resulted in jail time to the relevant parties rather than a monetary judgement that the won't be levied on the individuals in question.
Although it's preferable than nothing at all.
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It's an education culture problem, and big settlements simply don't fix that.
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so let me get this straight @8
I consider it an exploit , a hack , invasion of privacy and SICK SHIT
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I'd be filing a lawsuit against the lawyers in this case.
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-> No Crime has been committed.
Openly video taping of an officer in public,
-> Felony wiretaping
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...as is the lawyers getting most of the settlement.
Hmm. Couldn't we just drag both the school officials, and the lawyers, behind an old Dodge pick-up for a few blocks... you know... just to get their attention? (Kidding, of course... but, hey... one can dream, can't one?)
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But they really have been vilified.
See, the webcam is remotely turned on when a laptop is reported stolen, so that they can catch the thief. Meaning this kid probably stole the laptop (that is a persistent rumor) and therefore deserves it. Most of the 58,000 pics were probably from stolen computers anyway.
So yeah chill.
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Re:
Also, the student was reprimanded for what he appeared to be doing in the image, not theft.
In addition, it's doubtful the school would be settling so quickly if they'd acted properly.
Lastly, how many laptops have been stolen from this school to require 58,000 pics?
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Lawyers cost a lot
The victims were victimized, the lawyers did the work to actually DO something about it.. a service that takes a lot of manhours, expertise, and expensive sub-services to win your case.
Lawyers aren't your rock star agent middleman that should be taking 10% at most, they are your carpenter that takes your blueprints and makes your plan a reality.
They did the work, while you watch. They deserve a big chunk of the payoff on top of expenses.
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Lawyers
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