New York Times: Vague Cyberbullying Law

[forum_admin]

Lori Drew acted grotesquely if, as prosecutors charged, she went online and bullied her daughter’s classmate, a 13-year-old girl who ended up committing suicide. A federal court was right, however, to throw out her misdemeanor convictions recently. The crimes she was found guilty of, essentially violating the MySpace Web site’s rules, are too vague to be constitutional.

As Judge George H. Wu of the United States District Court for the Central District of California rightly held, a federal law that makes violating a Web site’s terms of service a crime is unconstitutionally vague. The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution requires laws to contain “relatively clear guidelines as to prohibited conduct.” Ms. Drew’s conviction fails this test. The average users of any Web site has no reason to believe they are breaking federal law by violating terms of service.

Lawmakers should enact laws that can withstand challenge to give prosecutors tools to go after bullying of all kinds. What prosecutors cannot do is stretch federal law to label run-of-the-mill Internet activity as criminal.

More...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/08/opinion/08tue2.html