Judge Acquits Lori Drew in Cyberbullying Case, Overrules Jury

[Quicksilver]

Not taking either side. But just wondering what's the use in have a trial if the judge gets to throw out a verdict by a jury...........
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/07/drew_court/

LOS ANGELES — A federal judge on Thursday overturned guilty verdicts against Lori Drew, issuing a directed acquittal on three misdemeanor charges.

Drew, 50, was accused of participating in a cyberbullying scheme against 13-year-old Megan Meier who later committed suicide. The case against Drew hinged on the government’s novel argument that violating MySpace’s terms of service was the legal equivalent of computer hacking. But U.S. District Judge George Wu found the premise troubling.

[X5Flyboy]

unlike the old nursery rhyme..., words can hurt - my question is the identical harassment toward POWs is considered "torture", but not if you are a citizen?????

[StanF18]

Ah yes, I remember this case, as it received quite a lot of publicity at the time.

If you take a step back from the emotional aspect of the case, and look at the prosecution's argument solely on its' merits, I have to say the judge made the right call here. Missouri prosecutors could not bring the case due to lack of a State anti-cyberbullying law, so the Feds got involved and tried a different tactic. I commend them for trying to go the "anti-hacking" route, but it was a shaky premise.

This case is a great example of the dichotomy between Law and Morality. Most "reasonable" folks would find Lori Drew's alleged actions despicable, myself included. But trying to pin the poor girl's suicide on her by using a round-about anti-hacking and Terms of Service argument is a real stretch, at best.

Furthermore, while what happened was a tragedy, one could easily argue that almost all teenagers would NOT have commited suicide in such a situation. They would have been hurt, yes, emotionally wounded perhaps...but this girl had to have underlying mental issues/conditions to take it to the next level. Suicides are just an everpresent part of the human condition. If we let the government try to assign blame to the multitude of suicides taking place every day, we won't have enough jail cells to hold the alleged "precipitators".

[B-Line]

what are the cliff's of the incident that prompted the case?

[X5Flyboy]

the same words from a parent would be called child abuse - don't know why you would not consider this the same way

[Dannyell]

Stan very well put