Dead Marine's kin plead for e-mail (From Yahoo)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/internet/12/21/soldier.email.ap/index.html

The family of a Marine killed in Iraq is pleading with Internet giant Yahoo! for access to his e-mail account, which the company says is off-limits under its privacy policy.

Lance Cpl. Justin M. Ellsworth, 20, was killed by a roadside bomb on November 13 during a foot patrol in Al Anbar province. The family wants the complete e-mail file that Justin maintained, including notes to and from others.

"I want to be able to remember him in his words. I know he thought he was doing what he needed to do. I want to have that for the future," said John Ellsworth, Justin's father. "It's the last thing I have of my son."

[Maat]

1. Oh, come on Yahoo.

Who is going to sue you? The family? It is the least that you can do.

I'm no lawyer (yet), and can't give legal advice, but surely the e-mails can be considered his property ... and a judge can order them given to his next-of-kin.


They would be mean to destroy them.

[hlthe2b]

8. Just like diaries, book notes and drafts.... I would think probate court

would surely award rights to the next of kin or whoever was named in a will. Yahoo won't have a choice at that point...

But, the family needs to serve Yahoo with notice that they intend to gain rights and perhaps get a court order to prevent the destruction...

[L.A.dweller]

42. To think that a 20

year old would write a will out before going to Iraq is heartbreaking.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

22. It's a contract, not property

The kid entered into a contract with Yahoo. It's terminated in 90 days, according to the terms of the contract. That's it.

If the young man wanted people to have access to his email, I think he'd have given them his password, and then all of this would be moot.

Making an exception here is asking for everyone's privacy to be violated because of grieving family, and I, for one, don't want that to happen.

(Now, Maat, back to the books - check out your Property casebook and your Contracts casebook and see why this is correct. It's fun reasoning and very simple black-letter law.)

[Maat]

33. Okey-dokey.

I'm on it!

[Yuugal]

2. wtg yahoo!

If they bent the rules a little and resent any stuff he had sent to the family's addys I wouldn't mind but I certainly don't want my provider sending my complete mail history to my family or anyone else when I die. Stuff like, "Mom's meatloaf tasted like a cross between sawdust and cowflop", might cause hard feelings.

[babylonsister]

3. But the marine might also have been

e-mailing others about his real feelings towards this bogus war. That would be worth seeing by anyone, and might change some hearts and minds.

[gennifer6]

5. Yes and No

anything he emailed from Iraq to the US I would certainly let the family have, but I agree that to open his complete email history to them is wrong....yahoo could do this with a combination of compassion and discretion.

[bush_is_wacko]

7. Oh, come on

I have lost love ones. It doesn't hurt anyones feelings to read they were a real human being after they are gone. Anything you can save for prosperity at that point helps the greiving process. Yahoo, release his freakin' emails to the family, it will only serve to help them recover from what is likely the most painful thing they will ever have to deal with! Kids should NEVER die before thier parents. It leaves a horrible scar behind and it changes your veiw of the world for life!

[gennifer6]

16. I've read certain writings by lost loved ones

and you're right, you read about them as the person they really were, but a person's right to privacy is just that, alive or dead. A Yahoo employee with a moderate amount of intelligence and good judgement could easily release some (if not all, maybe nothing negative was written?) of those emails....

[MessiahRp]

18. In an interesting twist...

What if they went in his box and found out he was into porn and courting trannys or worse he was a pedophile? He may have been in the military and unable to act that out but you'd be surprised what people do online.

Think their image of him wouldn't sour from that?

Rp

[bush_is_wacko]

21. Do you realize how rare that really is?

MSM, the fundies,evangelicals, and the MSM, would have us all beleiving that 48% of America is completely twisted. The reality is not so cut and dry. I would agree with you that yahoo should keep that information from his family, if it's there. But yahoo doesn't have to tell them they are doing that. The fact that they are outright refusing to give them anything is really sad. This family sacrificed a son, brother, etc. to * Co. Don't they deserve a little closure? Closure is bery hard to find when a loved one dies a brutal death. The family deserves a little piece of mind.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

23. First......

there is no such thing as "closure." Nothing ever ends. Loss lasts as long as you remember the loved one.

Second, you don't get anything you weren't supposed to have by invading the dead man's privacy.

Third, there are memories of the dead person that are only yours. Hold onto them, cherish them, honor them, because that's all you have.

Fourth, setting a bad precedent by trying to break a contract that the deceased had entered into voluntarily will only hurt others.

Finally, as I wrote above, if he'd wanted others to have access to his email account, he'd have given them his password. You'd better believe that my partners and spouse all know my passwords, and I know theirs.

[bush_is_wacko]

25. You're right on the closer issue

but I hate to say it. I learned more about my relatives in death reading poems and letters they wrote than I ever could have learned from them in life. I suspect when I go, my family will say the same. It does give one peace to know your loved one "lives" on through thier written words. I'm sorry you disagree with that, but I can tell you for certain the things you don't know your loved one has done to make the world a better place will always be revealed only after they die!

[MessiahRp]

29. I know

but it's a hell of a lot more interesting to post about the super crazy hypotheticals in this situation. And in a case like this, I think you have to consider all possibilities.

Rp

[purduejake]

34. Piece of mind?

Yahoo gives me piece of mind because if I died, I wouldn't want my parents to see private files. This is ridiculous- you don't need some damned emails for closure.

[saracat]

4. Mail is delivered to the family of the deceased. What would be the

difference? I thought the right to privacy ended with death. Any lawyers care to comment. I also thought contractual obligations ended at death so Yahoo's obligation would be treminated. What gives with this?

[lastliberalintexas]

12. It depends

Usually, the right to privacy does not actually end with death, particularly with regard to medical information. But in this type of situation you're not just talking about their son's right to privacy. The person(s) involved with him in any email chain would have an expectation of privacy as well, and those people are most likely still living. If the parents were given full access to his entire account, they might become privy to information intended solely for their son from another. That's probably a big concern for Yahoo. Usually right to privacy arguments are only made with respect to the government's desire to confiscate materials, but they have been used more and more against private entities in recent years.

Contractual obligations usually do end with death, but not always. Depending on the type of contract, the estate could be forced to honor the remainder of the term.

I don't know enough details about this situation to say that Yahoo is wrong or not. But I'd probably have advised them to deny access as well. :shrug:

[LiberalFighter]

35. What mail? Mail intended for the individuals?

Mail that they sent to the soldier? If that family is part of the same household.

That would be appropriate.

Mail that was intended for someone else or wasn't sent by them? No

If the soldier has lived on his owned his parents would not have any rights to any of his belongings. Unless there is a will that states that certain individuals shall receive items nothing can be done with the effects until they go through probate.

If the soldier is married and has a wife then the wife has all rights to belongings.

That is my thought... some points above may need clarified by those with legal expertise.

As for the contract ending at the death of one side would depend on other law. Technically the estate of an individual becomes responsible for all outstanding debts unless the individual is married.

I am not a lawyer.

[BOHICA06]

6. They have the emails ....

intended for them. That is all they are entitled to. Yahoo is right.

[TahitiNut]

9. The 'intellectual property' would be a part of his estate.

I see no basis for keeping it from the executors of that estate, and the inheritors - presumably his parents.

[NashVegas]

11. Think About This

I use my Yahoo mail account for buying stuff off the web from sites I'm not sure won't spam me.

If I died in a plane crash, there are things I would much rather NOT have my family find when they're going through my belongings, some of which were purchased using said account as a contact addy - although now I think about it, maybe they'd get a good laugh. Hmmmmmm ... nevermind.

[juliagoolia]

15. Its just like going through your drawers

They will find all kinds of things.

When my rather stiff and reserved grandmother died in the 80's the granddaughters sorted through her things. In the bottom drawer we found something she made. She was a seamstress.

It was an apron with two fake pockets on the sides, and in the center sewn in was a "dildo" looking thing. a Joke apron she had made.. What a hoot. It changed our view of her, but heck it probably needed changing a little. We are all human.

WE also went through all her mail!!!!

[babylonsister]

19. You go, granny! nt

[LiberalFighter]

37. My sister died last year...

and we were cleaning up her place and my other sister who was named as the personal representative in the will found a few sex toys and she quickly put them out of site so my parents wouldn't see them.

[lastliberalintexas]

13. That would likely only include

emails *he* sent, but would likely exclude those he received. People with whom he corresponded still have an expectation of privacy, and their writings likely do not become property of his estate. Not certain though, since probate laws differ from state to state.

[TahitiNut]

14. It's my understanding that letters become the property of the addressee.

The mere fact that they're transmitted/conveyed is, as I understand it, a de facto conveyance of ownership.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

24. Letters

Letters always remain the property of the sender and cannot be disseminated or published without the express consent of the sender.

An oldie, but goodie.

[TahitiNut]

26. I believe I own any letter sent to me ...

... just as I own the books I've bought. While the writer may own the intellectual property rights, the ownership of that 'copy' which was legally conveyed to me is mine.

The issue, of course, becomes far more complex in the case of e-mail - since e-mail is a store-copy-transmit process. Every server in the transmission path stores a COPY of an e-mail. Thus, in sending an email the author is, in effect, authorizing the creation (publication) of many copies. Furthermore, e-mail has the intrinsic function of 'forwarding' which creates even more copies. One can only reasonbly assume that the ownership rights to a "piece" (whatever that means) of e-mail is no less than that of conventional letter (akin to a book).

The model I'd use is the authoring/publishing model. An e-mail account would, therefore, be akin to a collection of (purchased) books as well as final manuscripts of books written. In all cases, the ownership of the collection would accrue to the inheritor - the next-of-kin in this case. At least that's how I'd look at it.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

32. Belief is one thing

The law is another.

The letter's contents are the property of the sender. You may own the paper, but you do not have any ownership right to the ideas or words or writing on that paper, no matter what you believe.

Comparing publishing to letter-writing just doesn't fly here. Publishers buy words authors hold out for sale, via agents. Letter-writers are a whole different category, and like it or not, the words in the letter belong to the sender.

Ask companies who exert domain over their employees email accounts at work.

[TahitiNut]

40. Got a cite?

Cornell or Findlaw would do. A precedent in case law, relevant to email, would be great.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

41. It's not case law -

so citations don't hold here.

It's common law, black letter law.

Check any Property casebook, 1L, and you'll be able to read lots of about who owns what and in what form and how ownership passes and stuff like that. Very edifying and quite a lot of fun.

If you don't have the time to read the casebooks, check out Stoebuck and Whitman's hornbook.

[hlthe2b]

10. At probate, I don't think that is true....

But, Yahoo is probably on firm ground to wait any transfer pending an order from probate judge.

[LiberalFighter]

36. And if they had been sending email and set up their account properly..

they would have copies of all email that they sent to their son as well.

[MidwestTransplant]

17. It also violates the privacy of the people other than family

that he emailed.

[hippiechick]

20. If they were emails TO the family,

... shouldn't they already HAVE them ?

And if they read and deleted the emails he sent, then .... shame on them ~ apparently they weren't as precious when he was alive as they are now that he's dead ?

:shrug:


:hippie:

[NNN0LHI]

27. Sorry. No can do

Who says there is not something in there the soldier does not want his family to be privy to? Even in death? Yes it can happen. There is a reason for these privacy laws.

Don

[rodeodance]

28. I agree, I think the soldier should have his privacy--even in death!!

[Jack_DeLeon]

30. I agree with yahoo.

If someone wants all thier online stuff given to someone when they die they would put it in a will with thier passwords and logins.

[high density]

31. 90 day inactivity limit?

I know of a Yahoo! profile of a dead person that is still active long after 90 days, but I'm not sure if the email address still works.

Overall I have to agree with Yahoo! on this one. On a personal level I'd have no problem with Yahoo! giving my parents access to my account after my death, but I'm sure many other users certainly would not appreciate this being the default policy.

[Name removed]

38. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

39. Show us the pics, homey! Oh, I forgot. You were tombstoned.

[Theres-a]

43. reminds me of the phrase "taking my secret to the grave"

even if there weren't any secrets,it would set a precedent to allow this.

[proudbluestater]

44. I'm torn between the two sides, but I tend to side more with Yahoo.

I can understand how the parents feel, but I think Yahoo's policy is sound.

[high density]

45. New AP story: "Support For Parents Of E-mail GI"

Support For Parents Of E-mail GI
People across the country are mobilizing to help a Michigan family unlock the e-mail account of a fallen soldier.

The family of Justin M. Ellsworth believes that the account holds hundreds of e-mail dispatches from the 20-year-old Marine who was killed last month during a foot patrol in Iraq.

One man has started an online petition to pressure Yahoo! to allow Ellsworth's family access to the account so his father and stepmother can compile the e-mails in a scrapbook and have forever their son's last written words.

...

Lawyers have offered free legal services and other people have offered money to help the family pay costs they might incur. Two computer forensic examiners have offered to crack the mystery of the e-mail password for free.

More: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/12/22/national/main662548.shtml

Are they sure this guy didn't write his password down someplace or store it on his computer? I keep all of my passwords written down in a small notebook since I have so many of them.