MyCrimeSpace

Teen’s MySpace rant ruled free speech

by Trench on April 10th, 2007

Court reverses penalty over MySpace post:
This gets complicated so follow closely.

An unknown person created a fake MySpace profile that maligned Greencastle Middle School Principal Shawn Gobert. A teen who is identified as A.B. left an expletive laden comment on said MySpace about the school’s body piercing policy. Apparently Mr. Gobert made a federal case out of it, in the figurative sense, because…

The state filed a delinquency petition in March alleging that A.B.’s acts would have been harassment, identity deception and identity theft if committed by an adult. The juvenile court dropped most of the charges but in June found A.B. to be a delinquent child and placed her on nine months of probation. The judge ruled the comments were obscene.

Now the Indiana court of appeals has ruled that the judge that placed A.B. on probation violated her first amendment rights.

“While we have little regard for A.B.’s use of vulgar epithets, we conclude that her overall message constitutes political speech,” Judge Patricia Riley wrote in the 10-page opinion.

Now remember kids, she commented on a fake MySpace. She did not create the fake MySpace. Creating fake MySpaces of your school’s faculty will still get you in deep trouble.

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POSTED IN: Behavior