Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

News for nerds, stuff that matters

Slashdot Log In

Log In

Create Account  |  Retrieve Password

Lori Drew Cyber-Bullying Trial Begins

Posted by kdawson on Fri Nov 21, 2008 11:17 AM
from the trying-to-outlaw-acting-like-a-jerk dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The cyber-bullying trial of Lori Drew opened yesterday. She was indicted for conspiring to access and accessing MySpace illegally in order to 'further a tortious act, namely, intentional infliction of emotional distress' (PDF of the indictment). The BBC has background on the case, the NYTimes covers the opening statements, and Wired has today's testimony."
+ -
story

Related Stories

[+] Your Rights Online: Woman Indicted In MySpace Suicide Case 654 comments
longacre writes "The Associated Press is reporting an indictment has been handed down in the sad case of Megan Meier, the girl who committed suicide after receiving upsetting MySpace messages from someone she perceived to be her boyfriend. It was later determined the boy, Josh Evans, was a fictitious identity created by a neighbor of Meier's family. Lori Drew, of a St. Louis suburb, has been charged with 'one count of conspiracy and three counts of accessing protected computers without authorization to get information used to inflict emotional distress on the girl.' Interestingly, despite the alleged crime having occurred strictly in Missouri, the case was investigated by the FBI's St. Louis and Los Angeles field offices, and the trial will be held in Los Angeles, home of MySpace's servers. Wired is running a related story about the potentially 'scary' precedent this case could set."
[+] Your Rights Online: Lori Drew Trial Results In 3 Misdemeanor Convictions 568 comments
grassy_knoll writes "As a follow up to an earlier story, the Lori Drew 'cyber-bullying' trial has resulted in misdemeanor convictions." grassy_knoll quotes from the AP story as carried by Salon: "The Los Angeles federal court jury on Wednesday rejected felony charges of accessing a computer without authorization to inflict emotional distress on young Megan Meier. However, the jury found defendant Lori Drew guilty of three counts of the lesser offense of accessing a computer without authorization. The jurors could not reach a verdict on a conspiracy count. Prosecutors said Drew violated the MySpace terms of service by conspiring with her young daughter and a business assistant to create a fictitious profile of a teen boy on the MySpace social networking site to harass Megan. Megan, who had been treated for depression, hanged herself in 2006 after receiving a message saying the world would be better without her." Adds reader gillbates: "She now faces up to 3 years in jail and $300,000 in fines — a troubling precedent for anyone who has ever registered with a website under a pseudonym."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
 Full
 Abbreviated
 Hidden
More
Loading... please wait.
  • Overreaching (Score:4, Insightful)

    by GMonkeyLouie (1372035) <gmonkeylouie@gmS ... com minus distro> on Friday November 21 2008, @11:26AM (#25846775)
    Like the NYT article says, this does seem like a case the Federal statute doesn't technically apply to. It's a pretty blatant example of overreaching. However, this woman should clearly be punished. I think the trial's going to have to take a look into who actually wrote the messages that compelled suicide and exactly how much Ms. Drew knew about the victim's mental instability. I still don't know whether or not to think of this as an immature prank gone terribly, terribly wrong, or a real attempt to prey on a weak girl's vulnerable mental state.
    • Re:Overreaching (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jeffmeden (135043) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:32AM (#25846851) Homepage Journal

      I still don't know whether or not to think of this as an immature prank gone terribly, terribly wrong, or a real attempt to prey on a weak girl's vulnerable mental state.

      It's not both? This woman is a grade-A sociopath, regardless of whether or not she suspected her victim would be so gravely affected as to commit suicide. She needs to be institutionalized regardless of the outcome of her actions, it's just unfortunate that these kind of people are only brought to light when something tragic happens.

      • Re:Overreaching (Score:4, Insightful)

        by OrangeCowHide (810076) * on Friday November 21 2008, @11:46AM (#25847071)

        I have been reading about this case for some time. So far the known points are Lori Drew may have been aware that her assistant (Grills) and daughter were putting together a fake MySpace account to "befriend" one Megan Meier. The assistant and daughter exchanged messaged with the Meir girl pretending to be a boy from Florida who was interested in her. After something upset the real life relationship with the Drew daughter and the Meier girl, the daughter and Grills started using the fake MySpace account to send mean-spirited messages to Megan. Culminating in Grills sending a message telling Megan the world would be better off without her.

        You may not have noticed, but the only involvement ever mentioned in connection with Lori Drew is that she may have been aware the account was created. She did not herself create the account. She did not herself send messages to Megan Meier. She did not tell Meier to kill herself.

        How does this qualify as "Grade-A Sociopath"? I don't see that anything she did qualifies as wrong, let alone immoral, or illegal.

        But Dammit! we need vengeance, and we already gave immunity to Grills if she agreed to testify, so...

        • Re:Overreaching (Score:5, Informative)

          by Just Some Guy (3352) <kirk+slashdot@strauser.com> on Friday November 21 2008, @12:43PM (#25847873) Homepage Journal

          You may not have noticed, but the only involvement ever mentioned in connection with Lori Drew is that she may have been aware the account was created. She did not herself create the account. She did not herself send messages to Megan Meier. She did not tell Meier to kill herself.

          From Wired [wired.com]:

          Grills was in the kitchen with Drew and Sarah, Lori Drew's then-13-year-old daughter, when she proposed creating a fake MySpace account to get information on Megan. Drew applauded the plan, and thought it was funny, but did not herself conceive it, Grills said.
          The three of them crowded around Drew's computer as Grills set up the account. None of the three read MySpace's terms-of-service first, said Grills. As Grills began, Lori and Sarah Drew left for soccer practice, urging Grills to finish up in their absence.

          That's a little different than saying "she may have been aware the account was created". Also,

          Over the course of the 28 days the Josh Evans account was active, Lori Drew helped craft messages sent to Meier, Grills said, and assumed the Evans identity directly for at least one short exchange, when Grills messaged Meier and wound up talking with her mother instead. Tina Meier testified previously that she wrote "Josh" that she thought he should focus on kids his own age. Josh replied, "I understand."

          I'd be willing to downgrade her from "primary actor" to "willing participant", but I don't think you can say she was only partially involved.

      • Re:Overreaching (Score:5, Insightful)

        by TheRaven64 (641858) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:47AM (#25847087) Homepage Journal

        If we institutionalised sociopaths then a large number of corporations would be looking for new C?Os and a large number of political posts would be open.

        Not, actually, a bad thing, now I come to think of it...

        • Re:Overreaching (Score:4, Interesting)

          by inviolet (797804) <pineminder.yahoo@com> on Friday November 21 2008, @12:16PM (#25847489) Journal

          If we institutionalised sociopaths then a large number of corporations would be looking for new C?Os and a large number of political posts would be open.

          You jest, but leadership is what sociopaths are for.

          A sociopath (aka psychopath) lacks any empathy, and is only vaguely aware of long-term consequences. They are also very highly skilled at manipulation. This makes them ideal leaders in the face of an ill-willed adversary. Unfortunately, they hurt everyone they come in contact with, so outside of a leadership job they are loathsome. I have one in the office next door to mine, and the world would be a better place if she were to depart it.

          The rate at which mother nature presents us with sociopaths -- from 1% to 5%, it's hard to tell -- indicates the historical size of our tribes, assuming each tribe needs one sociopathic leader. If the birth rate of sociopaths is 2%, then our average tribe size throughout our history is 50.

        • Re:Overreaching (Score:4, Insightful)

          by MBGMorden (803437) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:02PM (#25847305)

          That opens a terrible door though. Do you really want the government with the power to declare an individual randomly "incapble of telling right from wrong" (maybe you voted for the wrong political party and now fit this criteria) and then institutionalized for it? Remember: it's for your own good.

          Truthfully, I think it's clear that what this woman did was wrong, and she SHOULD be punished, but we need to find a non-biased, and clear cut way that doesn't involve personal judgements to explicitly DEFINE what exactly she did wrong, and to what level people should be punished for it.

          • Re:Overreaching (Score:4, Insightful)

            by cayenne8 (626475) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:50PM (#25847965) Homepage Journal
            "Truthfully, I think it's clear that what this woman did was wrong, and she SHOULD be punished..."

            I think it was wrong too, but if there is no clear cut law on the books to prosecute her with, then they should have to deal with that fact, and let her go.

            They can not be enabled to stretch any law they like to try to catch someone doing something bad. That opens up a WHOLE new can of worms that we really don't want opened.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      If someone does something that is 'wrong' you make a law, you don't trample there rights and use incorrect laws.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      This woman can and will be punished in civil court which is where something like this belongs. She could probably be sued successfully for wrongful death and could definitely be sued successfully for the intentional infliction of emotional distress. She'll be taken to the cleaners and rightfully so. That combined with the public shaming that has come from the publicity surrounding this case is just punishment in my opinion. This woman did a very mean and petty thing that resulted in a real tragedy but at th
  • by MaxwellEdison (1368785) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:32AM (#25846861)

    The cyber-bullying trial of Lori Drew

    Its a nice attempt, but it simply can't compete with the likes of The Exorcism of Emily Rose, or The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonzai Across the 8th Dimension. Or even The Adventures of Baron Munchausen for that matter.

  • by Jason Levine (196982) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:33AM (#25846867) Homepage

    What Lori Drew did was reprehensible and possibly illegal, but I get the feeling that she's being charged with the wrong crime. "Accessing MySpace illegally?" Now, I don't have a MySpace page, but it was my understanding that anyone could open a MySpace page and use it to contact other people. You don't even have to give your real name when you do so. I'd rather see some harassment charges or even something along the lines of manslaughter. What she did was psychologically manipulate that girl until she killed herself. That was the crime. MySpace was just the method.

    • If you read the story its because they can't nail her for the suicide they are doing this because "they have to do something". Which makes this case all the worse. I am wondering if the "hate crime" angle wasn't explored, its as silly as the approach they are taking.

      So basically she does something which causes another to harm themselves. Technically she didn't cause the harm and as such is immune to prosecution. So instead they will twist a law and trump up some charges on this twist in regards to rules violated no one would ever consider for serious prosecution.

      Lovely, whats next. If crap like this succeeds it opens everyone up to any fishing expedition law enforcement cares to make

    • Nice, you hit the nail right on the head. If this were done through any medium other than the internet, she would have gotten the charges you mentioned: harassment, maybe manslaughter, maybe accessory to a suicide. But since it's the big and scary internet (and who knows what your kids are doing on there) it's clearly her unfair voodoo use of MySpace that receives the most focus. Just imagine if she had written that teenaged girl a letter instead. Nobody would be saying that the big issue here was violating the ToS of the Postal Service.
  • by Drakkenmensch (1255800) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:36AM (#25846921)
    It seems to me that one of the implications brought by the defense here is that somehow, using a Facebook assumed identity to try and talk someone into killing themselves has less criminal value than writing threatening anonymous letters or talking on the phone while masking your voice. Shouldn't this whole trial be hinged on whether she has used her prior knowledge of the girl's emotional distress to talk her into suicide, rather than whether or not she commited computer fraud?
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      "..., rather than whether or not she commited computer fraud?"

      A) Is that a crime? as in written into law.

      B) If it is, that would be hard to prove.

      If there is no law, then she shouldn't be tried. Use this effort to make a good law, not to stretch existing laws far beyond their intent.

  • A better crime? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Hikaru79 (832891) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:44AM (#25847035) Homepage
    I don't understand... clearly the charges are just the first thing they could think of to charge this terrible woman with, because the actual wrong committed (driving a girl to suicide) is not explicitly illegal anywhere. So they chose... 'computer fraud' and violating MySpace TOS?

    Hello!? This is a 30+-year-old woman lying about her identity in order to start a romantic relationship with a 13-year-old girl! Of course her intent was not sexual but if Lori Drew's HUSBAND had perpetrated this exact same "prank" I guarantee the not-quite-accurate charge would have been sexually soliciting a minor, not breaking a EULA!

    The jury is sympathetic enough in this case that I think this charge could definitely pass...
  • by MikeRT (947531) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:44AM (#25847045) Homepage

    On the one hand, the federal case is rubbish. Intentionally inflicting emotional distress is so subjective of an offense as to be unconstitutional (judges have used vagueness as a reason to strike down statutes). This case is now clearly entirely one of catharsis for the community and a career opportunity for ambitious prosecutors.

    Yet, I think there can be a case under state law that Lori Drew murdered Megan Meier. I looked it up before, and remember seeing that it said that if you knowingly cause someone to be killed, then you are guilty of murder, and that's a good definition of what Drew did here. With basically demonic-level of malice of forethought, prodded and goaded this girl into exposing herself emotionally to a fictitious lover, knowing full-well that she had some severe issues with depression, and then she stabbed the girl and butterflied the wound.

    It's no wonder why Meier committed suicide. On some level, Drew knew what she was doing. It's already been established in previous reports that she knew all about this girl's psychological problems, and her reported behavior is that of a true predator. She can't claim innocence like "gee golly, I didn't know she very well might kill herself if I set her up for that much anguish and suggested to her that the world might be better off with out her (which Drew did suggest to her)."

    Personally, I would like to have seen a state prosecutor charge her with at least second degree murder because it's a very reasonable conclusion from the evidence that Meier wouldn't have committed suicide had Drew not done what she did, and Drew had a reasonable basis to know that her actions would lead to the girl's suicide.

    • by garett_spencley (193892) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:01PM (#25847289) Journal

      "Personally, I would like to have seen a state prosecutor charge her with at least second degree murder because it's a very reasonable conclusion from the evidence that Meier wouldn't have committed suicide had Drew not done what she did, and Drew had a reasonable basis to know that her actions would lead to the girl's suicide."

      IANAL but it's my understanding that the deference between first degree murder, second degree murder and manslaughter is premeditated, unplanned (ie: passion killing) and without the element of intent (wanted to hurt him, didn't mean to kill him) respectively.

      So by your logic the grounds would be first degree murder since, by your words, she had every reason to know that her actions would lead the girl's death and her actions were conducted over a period of time. Not in the heat of the moment.

  • as if the woman is prosecuted for saying she doesn't like gw bush online

    no folks, this is way beyond simple thought crime

    context is everything:

    1. the woman knew the girl was emotionally unstable
    2. the woman is an adult, the girl was a minor
    3. the woman purposefully set up a fake account with the intent of faking a boy who was interested in her, got her interested in this fake person, and then started insulting her, in the role of the fake boy, and suggesting she commit suicide

    in other words, an adult willfully manipulated an emotionally unstable minor over a prolonged period of time with the intent of causing her psychological harm

    surely some of you can support any law coming out of this case. surely some of you recognize this case is an extreme outlier and can in no way be confused with everyday garden variety trolling and meanness

    if the law is limited to the context of an adult purposefully causing psychological harm over a prolonged period of time to someone they KNOW is a minor and is emotionally unstable, surely you can see that the idea of a slippery slope does not apply

    context is everything, and the context here is really extreme

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      There is no crime there.
      It's wrong, but what law did she break?

      Of course

        • Re:technicality (Score:5, Insightful)

          by nedlohs (1335013) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:38PM (#25847807)

          That isn't how a fair justice system works.

          If what she did was so bad and she should be punished but she didn't break any laws then bad luck she should get away with it.

          The solution is to enact laws to make whatever is so bad a punishable offence. Now if she or anyone else does it again they can be punished.

          One person getting away with something is completely irrelevant - and in the grand scheme of things completely unimportant. Just pretend they never found out "who dun it" like with thousands of other crimes if it makes you feel better.

          If she's so evil she needs to be kept away fromk society, then she'll do it again and the new law can then be used. (and yes another dead person is a small price to pay, for staying away from being a total police state).

    • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by mewshi_nya (1394329) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:23AM (#25846725)

      Of course. But, then again, people are outraged over this; she supposedly broke the law to intentionally hurt someone.

      She's a bitch, and shouldn't be allowed in society. People like this are worthless pimples on the ass of society.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          Your post hurt my feelings so much that I attempted to commit suicide. You should be put behind bars for intentionally trying to hurt me through cyber-bullying.

          But seriously, STFU.

          Totally agree. If it hadn't been for this, she probably would have offed herself over something equally ignorant. Not to mention that this case is now about "hacking." Essentially, if convicted, it will make creating and using a fake account punishable by up to five years for each offense. I've created fake accounts plenty of times, enough that I would be able to spend the rest of my life in prison. We should really blame Hawthorne Heights and the like for perpetuating a scene that gives you more cool point

          • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

            by mewshi_nya (1394329) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:00PM (#25847275)

            And... lighting the bomb doesn't count as "bad"?

            No, you can't use the "It was BOUND to happen one way or another" excuse, either; unless you happen to have PERFECT evidence (IE the ability to see into the future) then you can't say for sure that she would have 'offed herself' as you so kindly put it.

            Plus, there is the "thin skull" thing in law; basically, if you do something that wouldn't cause a *normal* person harm, but the person has a pre-existing condition (in the original case, a thin skull that was struck and killed the person) that causes the 'normal' action to be deadly, it's *still* murder. In other words, ignorance of a pre-existing condition doesn't exempt you from your actions.

            • Re:Dragging on? (Score:4, Insightful)

              by cayenne8 (626475) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:43PM (#25847875) Homepage Journal
              While what the lady did was bad...I hope this the govt. loses this trial. They are really trying to stretch the intent of the law they are prosecuting her with, and it should not be allowed.

              They are only trying to do this route because there is NO law on the books against what she did. And allowing them to bend this law to get her would set an ominous precedent.

              This is much like years ago where I think it was a landlord, or maybe a neighbor set up cameras in someone house to spy on them nude or having sex. While it was a reprehensible act, there as no law on the books against it, and they had to let the perp go free. Laws were subsequently passed against this act, and that is how this case should be treated.

              That being said, I dunno how a law against this could be written to where it wasn't so overly broad that the mere flaming or bashing someone on the internet could result in prosecution because anyone could say they were being bullied. This would also probably hit some people that were fairly complaining about someone, or posting negative comments about them. It could hurt whistleblowers.

              I dunno if you can legislate anti-bullying.

              But, while this act was horrible, I think it is a case of where no law on the books is there to prosecute it, and I hope they are not allowed to try to bend a law that is clearly not applicable to this case, into a successful prosecution.

              • Re:Dragging on? (Score:4, Interesting)

                by Viceroy Potatohead (954845) on Friday November 21 2008, @04:21PM (#25851123) Homepage

                They are only trying to do this route because there is NO law on the books against what she did. And allowing them to bend this law to get her would set an ominous precedent.

                Are we sure about that?

                I know in Canada we have a "sexual interference with a minor" law, maybe Missouri has something applicable. She certainly carried on a courtship with the girl. And it's pretty obvious that Megan was interested romantically. as well, one of the topics of discussion was sex.

                If Lori Drew were a guy (other than a congressman, of course), I have little doubt he'd be in jail now, and on a sex-offender registry as well. I agree that the statutes they are using are rubbish, but I wouldn't be surprised if some sex-crime statute has been violated.

                At the risk of having a "what about the children" moment... The amount of callous comments here are ridiculous (not directed at P). An adult psychologically manipulated and abused a kid, and it gets responded to by blaming the kid ("she would have done it anyways..." etc.).

                • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

                  by logjon (1411219) on Friday November 21 2008, @01:29PM (#25848503)
                  Bending the law is exactly what it is. And Capone did evade taxes, as he never paid taxes on his illegal gains.

                  This, on the other hand, is trying to take a hacking law and apply it to something that is clearly not, repeat, NOT hacking. Cayenne's phrasing, "ominous precedent," puts it pretty succinctly. The government can't be allowed to apply whatever law it feels like because the other ones don't fit. That's why we have laws in the first place.

                  It's unfortunate that every time a mother with a teary eye shows up on the TV, people get whipped into an emotional frenzy without taking a moment to evaluate the unintended consequences of their desired course of action.

            • Re:Dragging on? (Score:4, Informative)

              by csartanis (863147) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:45PM (#25847901)
              Add the fact that there was no ignorance of the pre-existing condition here. The woman was at one point a friend of the family and knew that this girl had depression and was taking medication to treat it.
              • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

                by Rary (566291) on Friday November 21 2008, @02:37PM (#25849515)

                For the love of all that is, people need to learn to take some fucking responsibility for the their own actions!

                Every time I hear/read someone talking about people taking responsibility for their actions, they're always letting someone else get off scott free on their actions.

                The girl killed herself. She has already paid for her actions. Now it's time for the woman to take responsibility for what she did.

                Did she kill the girl? No. Did she contribute to the girl's decision to kill herself? Yes.

                Why do you insist that certain people (the girl who killed herself) have to be responsible for their actions, while other people (the woman who helped drive the girl to do it) do not?

                And drop the "I was bullied and didn't kill myself so no one else can use that as an excuse" bullshit. People are different. People's circumstances are different. If you got through your own torment and came out okay, then good for you. That has absolutely nothing to do with anyone else's circumstances, ever.

              • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Informative)

                by sammy baby (14909) on Friday November 21 2008, @02:42PM (#25849571) Journal

                Is this woman a horrible person, yes, is she responsible for *murder*!?!?! HELL NO.

                Your post would make sense if she were being charged with murder. However [bbc.co.uk]:

                Ms Drew is being charged under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act - usually used against computer hackers, as prosecutors were unable to find any existing laws within the state of Missouri under which she could be tried.

                IANAL. But the relevant bits here are that the defendant appears to have lied regarding her identity to multiple parties, for the express purpose of inflicting emotional harm on someone. As it turns out, the mere act of her lying is prosecutable, because it led to damages (emotional harm contributing to the victim's suicide).

                "She's not guilty of murder" is a straw man - if the DA thought there was a murder charge worth prosecuting there, they likely would have pursued it. This isn't a murder charge.

                  • Re:Dragging on? (Score:4, Insightful)

                    by Rary (566291) on Friday November 21 2008, @02:57PM (#25849745)

                    ...we do not legislate morality...

                    Is the question of whether or not it is okay to kill anything other than a moral question?

                    All laws are based on morality, and there are even many laws that enforce someone's view of "moral activity" despite having no bearing on anyone outside of the perpetrators (whereas something like murder clearly affects more than just those involved). For example, prostitution laws. Or how about laws against consensual oral and/or anal sex that exist in some States? Or, to delve into an issue of contemporary civil law, how about the law preventing people from marrying members of the same sex?

                    If Ms. Drew is legally responsible for this girl's death, then should rappers be responsible for someone doing drive-bys because they heard it in the lyrics, or, to use an old reference, should Beavis and Butthead be responsible for some kids burning down a trailer park because the cartoon characters were pyros?

                    The primary difference between this case and the examples you provided is that her actions were specifically directed at the victim with the intention of harming said victim. And she succeeded in doing just that.

                  • Re:Dragging on? (Score:4, Insightful)

                    by budgenator (254554) on Friday November 21 2008, @07:41PM (#25853803) Journal

                    I got the impression she was a domineering helicopter mom constantly interfering in her daughter's life from the wired article. Her daughter got into a "fight" with Megan and it sounded like it was over and forgotten and/or forgiven but her Mom couldn't let it go. In most states the Mom might have easily been convicted of stalking, involuntary manslaughter, and conspiracy which would easily put her into 3 time loser category for an extra 5 years as well. Pathetic isn't the word I would chose, predatory is.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            She would have "offed" herself eventually? Perhaps she was on the brink of getting therapy and becoming a more stable person. But now she's dead and doesn't have a chance of getting better.
              • by DrYak (748999) on Friday November 21 2008, @02:27PM (#25849405) Homepage

                The health professional who allowed the girl's condition to deteriorate so while under his/her care is another story altogether, and is at least most likely guilty of malpractice.

                Well, I can't manage to find precise information about the drug the girl was treated with, but fact is, some anti-depressant, specially old one [wikipedia.org] which work on the dopamine & adrenaline pathways (less the more recent which work on the serotonin pathways) have quite some secondary effect.
                Normally depression is associated with a strong lack of will and lack of energy, the patient just sits around and doesn't want to do anything (aboulia in latin, sorry don't know the proper english word).
                The old antidepressant have a much quicker effect on the the lack of will, than on the sadness and morbid thoughts of depression. This leaves a window during which the patient has already more energy to act, but still has lots of dark/sad ideas. During this period, the patient has a higher risk to enact the dark thoughs and thus the risk of suicide is elevated.

                This risks require proper monitoring of the patient and perhaps, if that's the case, the poor girl was left too much unattended.

                I don't think it's a real malpractice coming from the doctor (I don't thing the doctor really fucked up somewhere). But on the other hand insisting a little bit more about the dangers when speaking with the parents would perhaps attracted their attention that girl was going to be quite fragile during the first phase of the therapy.

                Other things strike as rather odd :
                - She wasn't completely isolated socially, according to wikipedia the girl participated in outdoor activities, etc. For someone not living completely isolated to reach a point where enacting suicide is a sign of very deep problems, the things that could be easily triggered by seemingly mundane situation.

                - She commited suicide by hanging according to wikipedia. This is a method with a certain success rates. This isn't the typical girl's suicide (most girls statistically are more likely to resort to less "definitive" ways, like sleep pill overdoses). Often the suicide attempts look a lot like a "call to help".
                The hanging show quite some determination to kill herself.

    • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by internerdj (1319281) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:24AM (#25846739)
      When was the proper time to have resolved bullying? It has been an issue for years and has resulted in some pretty nasty retaliation. Noone has cared about it till someone stuck cyber in front of it. Thats it I'm adding cyber to the front of my name so everyone cares about me...
    • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by russotto (537200) on Friday November 21 2008, @11:24AM (#25846743) Journal

      This is one of those hard cases which is going to make bad law. There was nothing legitimate to charge Lori Drew with, so they went reaching for any tool available -- in this case, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which has already been pretty badly stretched. If Drew is found guilty (and she will be, on the emotional factor), that sets the precedent that violation of Terms of Service is now a criminal act. Talk about a big stick for ISPs to beat customers with... (share your wifi, go to jail...)

      • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by b4upoo (166390) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:02PM (#25847313)

        It seems to me that this case must not stand. For one it makes the ISP an agent of the state. For example to lie in a court trial carries a penalty. To lie in a cash transaction may carry a penalty. But lying in social situations is not something that carries weight. In essence it is like saying that a lie told at a cocktail party is the same as a lie told in court.
                      Further, people who go online in social contact areas have prior knowledge that all kinds of nonsense may occur. They are free never to enter or to surf to another type of site at any time. It's like porn. If you don't like it you change the channel or turn of the TV.
                      And I'm not so sure that anything done purely online can ever reach the edge of torture or harassment. We are not talking about Geronimo and a large group of hostile Apaches circling the wagons here. Vulnerable people need to buck up and stop expecting the world to conform to their tender needs..

      • by copponex (13876) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:09PM (#25847387) Homepage

        Right now, everyone in America is breaking a law. Whether they are punished for the breach depends on how much money they have, who they know, who they have cheated, and if the public is aware of the crime or not.

        They are there so if you get in the way of the powerful, they can throw the book at you. In this case, it's a good thing, since this person, for no other reason than malice, emotionally abused someone just for the "fun" of it. Other times, victimless crimes like possession are used to keep the prison population high and the ghettos under control.

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        ...so they went reaching for any tool available -- in this case, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act...

        And such a shame, too! If they had reached another foot or so they could have grabbed the sledgehammer. :(
      • Re:Dragging on? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by v1 (525388) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:17PM (#25847517) Homepage Journal

        nothing new here unfortunately . I've long since grown tired of seeing people do things that are perhaps immoral, but not illegal, only to see some unrelated, irrelevant law bent in an attempt to make what they did illegal.

        The "bad laws" are the problem here. Too many new laws are hitting the books either with little care taken to limit their scope, or to outright ignore limitations. Loopholes and overly broad definitions are woven in, under the guise that something in the legal machine will act as a sanity-check and "but no one would ever abuse the law". I'm not sure if they're being naive, or doing it on purpose. I know I've long since learned, anything that can be abused, will be abused eventually. It always works that way. Always has, always will. Make something open to abuse, and it will get abused, usually sooner than you expect.

        When you make a law with the hopes that some sanity check will prevent abuse, such as interpretation of a vaugity in the law by a judge, you'll find that some judges are naive, some judges have an agenda, and some parties have bottomless wallets to tilt the balances in their favor. The latter of the three being the major problem lately. You can never rely on "the system" only interpreting a law the "correct" way. Either you spell it out, or may as well not even bother. Making a vague law is worse than making no law at all, because when you make a vague law, you transform a situation from being undefined, to being possibly legal or possibly illegal, depending on the day of the week.

        • Re:Dragging on? (Score:4, Interesting)

          by VeNoM0619 (1058216) on Friday November 21 2008, @02:06PM (#25849041) Journal

          I know I've long since learned, anything that can be abused, will be abused eventually

          To make an analogy for /.:
          Most programmers make mistakes
          Most groups of programmers make mistakes (no matter how big your group is)

          These mistakes do get abused eventually. The problem is that there is no one doing 'sanity' tests on these laws and attempting to abuse them before they get made, while we have companies who do 'sanity' tests with QA and hired security consultants.

          You are right, we need more sanity checks, especially for things like laws, the controlling factor of society.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      This issue seems to me one of the trials that are just to have a spotlight on a particular issue and could have been resolved earlier without the fanfare.

      Resolved without a trial? You mean like "by death-squad"?
    • by 0100010001010011 (652467) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:33PM (#25847745)

      It's the boyfriend that strangled her to death and hung her in her room making it look like the fault of the woman that was harassing her.

      Or am I the only one that watches Law and Order.

    • Wrong Way (Score:4, Insightful)

      by maz2331 (1104901) on Friday November 21 2008, @12:24PM (#25847611)

      Actually, the big issues here are that the law is being misapplied to fit circumstances clearly not within its purview, and the action itself isn't actually criminal.

      This is a perfect case for a civil suit instead. What they are doing is taking a "tort" (punished via lawsuit) and turning it into a "crime" (punished via criminal charges and prison).

      This entire case should have been in a civil court from the beginning.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      What's so special about the internet? If I do some offline trolling [kuro5hin.org] ("I guessed she knew Jarry then, but didn't say so. It seems that the married guy had a few beers, too, bacause he's telling me he was fucking Jennie when she was 15. She looks decidedly embarrassed. So I take a shot in her behalf. 'Oh, then you're a pedophile?'") and the guy kills himself over it. Is there a law that would have me incarcerated? If so, use that law for the internet. If not, then again, what makes doing it on the internet an