Teen's Mom Testifies in MySpace Hoax Trial

[BlueJessamine]

Source: ABC News

Federal prosecutors on Wednesday accused a suburban mother of using MySpace to prey on an insecure teenager who later committed suicide.

Prosecutors say Lori Drew, 49, along with her daughter and an assistant, used the social networking Web site to pretend to be a 16-year-old boy named "Josh," who befriended, flirted with and ultimately rejected Megan Meier, a 13-year-old who lived down the street.

Megan killed herself, prosecutors said, after receiving nasty messages from "Josh."

Drew has been charged with conspiracy and three counts of unauthorized access to protected computers; each charge carries a maximum five-year prison term. She has pleaded not guilty and, if convicted, will likely face a lower sentence under federal guidelines.

Megan's mother, Tina Meier, struggled to hold back tears on the witness stand Wednesday as she described her final conversations with her daughter.



Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=6297275&page=1

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The trial, in federal court in Los Angeles, will focus not on whether Drew caused Megan to commit suicide, but on a seemingly more mundane issue: whether Drew violated MySpace's terms of service in order to inflict emotional distress on Megan.

The case is believed to be one of the first of its kind to use the statute barring unauthorized access to computers, which has previously been used to combat computer hacking, to address so-called cyberbullying. Drew's lawyers and outside legal experts have argued that the unusual prosecution, if successful, could broaden the scope of what's considered criminal conduct on the Internet.


'Not Like I Pulled the Trigger'
Prosecutors claim that after Drew learned what had happened, she told her daughter and Grills to delete the MySpace account and told the girl who said that Josh no longer wanted to be Megan's friend to "keep her mouth shut." At one point, after admitting she had told others to take down the MySpace page, Drew allegedly said, "It's not like I pulled the trigger," prosecutors say.

[glowing]

1. Seriously, how F'd up can you be to mess with a child? Who's supposed to be the adult?

[wartrace]

2. Very seriously evil.

To do that to a kid because your own kid "doesn't like her"? Reminds me of that mother who killed off her daughters cheer leading competitors so her kid could get on the squad. If this woman spends the next twenty years in prison I think it would be real justice.

[Kelvin Mace]

4. Well, to be pedantic

as I recall the case, no one was actually killed. The mom was tried for conspiracy to commit murder in that she wanted to kill a girl's mother:

A mother charged with trying to hire a professional killer to improve her daughter's chances of becoming a high school cheerleader goes on trial Monday in a state court.

The 36-year-old defendant, Wanda Holloway, faces up to life in prison if convicted of offering $2,500 last January to an undercover police officer to kill the mother of her daughter's chief rival in cheerleading tryouts.

The police say Mrs. Holloway wanted to kill a neighbor, Verna Heath, so her 13-year-old daughter, Amber, would be too grief-stricken to compete with Mrs. Holloway's daughter, Shanna, also 13, for the cheering squad at Channelview High School. The school's cheering squads have won national championships.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE7D71138F936A1575BC0A967958260

As I recall, Holloway originally got 15 years, but the trial was overturned because of juror misconduct. Rather than face a second trial, she plead no contest and got ten years, but only served six months and was released on 9­­.5 years probation.

Way too lenient if you ask me.

[Alter Ego]

11. What. The. Fuck.

How fucking "I'M LIVING VICARIOUSLY THROUGH MY SWEET LITTLE GIRL BECAUSE I HAVE DEEP-SEATED DADDY ISSUES" do you have to be? That woman should be in a straitjacket and padded room.

[Kelvin Mace]

12. Yeah, she was one sick puppy

and I like to keep sick puppies under CLOSE observation.

[John Q. Citizen]

5. Some people are insane.

[wartrace]

7. I don't think she is insane, just plain evil.

There are people out there who LIVE to destroy others. It's a shame she didn't pick on someone her own age though, instead of a vunerable child. Thats what makes her evil.

[Lance_Boyle]

3. of what legal use was the mother's testimony?

This is a trial about "unauthorized access of computer systems," or so the witch-hunt DA would have us believe. Of what potential legal use is a dead girl's mother in this case? Why on Earth was she permitted to testify? The DA prosecuting this abortion of a trial should be disbarred.

Good thing this will be a mistrial now, as it never should have been a trial in the first place. Ms. Drew is disgusting, but innocent of any crime.

[pacalo]

6. I don't disagree totally, but I do like the DA's thinking. He should use whatever law he can

to prosecute viciousness in this case, which led to the victim's suicide.

Remember what it was like to be young & vulnerable to peer pressure. I do remember & I feel extremely grateful that there was no internet back when I was in school. The anonymity of the internet enables kids today to make life impossible for unwary victims as well as blatant, in-your-face bullying, as is the case with a Lifetime movie I saw, which was based on a book called, "Odd Girl Out".

Here's a publisher's review of "Odd Girl Out":

Although more than 16 years have passed, Rhodes Scholar Simmons hasn't forgotten how she felt when Abby told the other girls in third grade not to play with her, nor has she stopped thinking about her own role in giving Noa the silent treatment. Simmons examines how such "alternative aggression" where girls use their relationship with the victim as a weapon flourishes and its harmful effects. Through interviews with more than 300 girls in 10 schools (in two urban areas and a small town), as well as 50 women who experienced alternative aggression when they were young, Simmons offers a detailed portrait of girls' bullying. Citing the work of Carol Gilligan and Lyn Mikel Brown, she shows the toll that alternative aggression can take on girls' self-esteem. For Simmons, the restraints that society imposes to prevent girls from venting feelings of competition, jealousy and anger is largely to blame for this type of bullying. It forces girls to turn their lives into "a perverse game of Twister," where their only outlets for expressing negative feelings are covert looks, turned backs and whispers. Since the events at Columbine, some schools have taken steps to curb relational aggression. For those that haven't, Simmons makes an impassioned plea that no form of bullying be permitted.

Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Odd Girl Out @ Amazon

In my opinion, this mother who took part in & encouraged her bully daughter & her bully friends to crush this girl to the extent that she took her own life is at least partly responsible for the suicide. Parents should be peacemakers who discourage bullying, not taking part in it.

[Lance_Boyle]

9. the problem is that 'viciousness' is not a crime

I could get behind drafting a new law (ptooey!) to deal with this kind of situation, but even that leaves Ms. Drew innocent on the whole ex post facto thing. The DA stretching to prosecute on hacking charges should result in his disbarment. If there is no law against it, it's not illegal, no matter how despicable. Simple as that.

[stanwyck]

10. As truly detestable as I find this women, I agree

with your assessment. They're using a law which is not applicable to go after this horrible woman. This isn't how our judicial system should work.

[LisaL]

8. What makes you think this will be a mistrial?

The judge allowed this testimony.
It seems to me as if they are trying the woman for the girl's suicide. Breaking my space service agreement? Does that mean that if someone posts incorrect information about themselves on my space they can go to prison for it?
The girl who killed herself wasn't even supposed to be posting on my space. She was 13, which is too young.