Another interesting point is when the system acts irrationally, this is not lost on psychopaths and those with evil and malicious intents.

Knowing that a snapshot of a Facebook post taken out of context can land that person in jail for months is a goldmine opportunity for some people.

This just adds to the list the other things could include: plant child porn on their machine, call the terrorist hotline with a tip, launch a flood of ssh port scans into a .mil address from their machine, and bam! easy peasy that person's life is ruined.

This is not unlike the witch hunts in repressive regimes where people are encouraged to rat on each other. Quite often that is taken advantage. It used to be report the person to be a "Communist" or "report that person to be an Anti-Communist".

Unless there is public and swift punishment for the prosecutors or the "professionals" in the chain of people this has passed through, this will repeat again and again. There is just very little incentive not to "keep going" with these tips. The potential repercussions for ignoring it could be much harsher. So why not...

A Facebook post out of context, heck... you could doctor the HTML using browser dev tools to make anyone appear to say anything at all on Facebook.

As a person who has sat on a grand jury, I can speak from personal experience, and let me tell you:

Listening to pud-pulling detectives stumble through the technical details of correlating an IP address to a service provider, at the rehearsed prompts provided by power-tripping district attourneys, and then glancing across the 22 other grand jurors, some withed glazed eyes, and others desperately nodding in agreement, as if they had something to prove to the phantom presence of their usually condescending 13-year-old children about their technical savvy, and the relationship that holds with being able to read a cable bill, I was deeply disturbed by the very low bar that was set, in order to prove to the lowest common denomenator that someone committed a computer crime, when I was out-voted on a whether to bring a flimsy case to trial.

Afterward, I casually chatted up each of the people that voted to bring a guy before the judge for allegedly creating fake credit cards and charging thousands of dollars under someone else's name, to gauge whether they understood what they had just voted on.

Most of them had a hard time using their smart phones for anything besides phone calls, couldn't tell me what an IP address actually was, couldn't readily distinguish AOL dial up service and AOL keyword searches from "Googling the internet" or typing in a URL in their browsers address bar, and were mystified by the difference between typing up a Word document and attaching it to an e-mail, versus just typing and sending the e-mail itself.

The difference between how quickly things went to trial, or how long we deliberated on a particular case often hinged on how close to 5PM it was. The DA's seemed to be aware of this, and the complexity and "appeal" of cases and the order of their presentation seemed to be planned accordingly.

Seems exactly like modern day witchcraft/wizardry hunt.

If a Middle Age dude was an expert in chemistry, he'd probably be tried quite similarly. The fact that no one around him could even comprehend what chemistry is, is now completely irrelevant to them ruining his life.

Now replace that with technology, the people with modern day morons and death with impossibly high bail/languishing in prison for years together ruining any chance of an average, let alone decent future and you've got what we have today.

The point is, they don't know the subject yet feel that they know enough. History, it seems never changes.

For those more familiar with legal proceedings :

Was the defense not able to submit the IM context themselves? The conclusion seems to be that it would basically exonerate him, so why could they not disclose it?

The article goes so far as to mention the context "hasn't surfaced". Why on earth not? Is this because Facebook refuses to release the IM history?

IANAL, but maybe they are denying he wrote the comments

Important to point out, re the restraining order, that according to the article he wasn't given the opportunity to respond to the charges made against him. Restraining orders aren't convictions, I am surprised that it seems they can be used as evidence given that they apparently do not imply any finding of fact.

In a witch hunt, a lack of evidence implies a cover-up. A piece of non-evidence becomes a smoking gun. We've lost our heads.

> So I'll start by playing Devil's Advocate very briefly. It's interesting how facts can be shaped with different language ("his only brush with the law"): it appears the restraining order from two years prior related to similar threats to those alleged in the Facebook comments (although in a remarkably different context).

IANAL but I'm reasonably confident that a restraining order he received as a minor would not be admissible as evidence in this case, and thus should be irrelevant to the prosecution.

It is, however, when you're subjected to Trial by Media.

Don't know about the USA, but here in Canada the media is also disallowed from discussing young offenders.

He's no longer a minor, so does that still apply because he was a minor at the time it happened?

In Canada? Yup. The YOA is very expansive. For example, my neighborhood's most prolific tagger is in his mid-'20s and the press still isn't allowed to mention his name when he gets picked up for the nth time because he was previously arrested as a young offender. If they said "Joe Blow was arrested for writing tag X on an overpass" then everybody would know that Joe Blow is X and his young offenses of writing X on an overpass would be revealed.

You absolutely cannot be tied to crimes you committed as a youth. This way, no matter how bad you screw up, you have a clean slate as an adult.

I also feel that, if you are an adult and you've served your sentence and paid your debt to society, that your file is closed to the public. The only time it would be accessed is in determining the sentence for your next crime.

Adults deserve a second chance, too.

This cannot be stressed or up voted enough. One you have a black mark on your record in this country (USA), it never goes away. At least in most EU countries the law stipulates that after 7 years it's off your record. We, as a country, have given up on rehabilitation and reintegration.

> IANAL but I'm reasonably confident that a restraining order he received as a minor would not be admissible as evidence in this case, and thus should be irrelevant to the prosecution.

And yet it might be relevant to the reason he was arrested, if the quotation in the message above yours (which is unsourced) is true.

Kid gets arrested for Facebook talk: "INJUSTICE!"

...but he had a previous restraining order for similar threats: "They might have a point."

What's ridiculous about this case is that they kept at it.

The problem is, in most states its stupidly easy to get a TRO - you dont need proof, just fill out a form, indicate you feel threatened by someone, pay the fee, boom, TRO.

No, not actually enough for me to hedge that they might have a point...

The ideal of a government of laws is just an illusion. We are a government of men and women who pull whatever crap they can get away with.

This case was so badly botched even before one gets to free speech questions that one wonders why, at some point, the state didn't just admit error and agree to have the case dismissed. This reads like "let's see. There are 10 Amendments in the Bill of Rights. How many of them can we mess with? Now obviously we can't violate the 3rd, 9th, or 10th amendments here but maybe we can mess with the first, second, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eigth..."

One wonders why they stopped at the Bill of Rights. Maybe they could get the city to pass a Bill of Attainder while they are at it. Maybe they could have gone for broke and asked the state to station national guardsmen in his bedroom on release?

I'm gonna point out, getting a TRO in many states is as easy as filling out a form, and paying a fee. All you need to do is state you feel threatened by someone.

> Until that point, his only brush with the law was a temporary restraining order two years earlier.

It doesn't have much to do with his danger anyways, as far as I'm concerned. Adam Lanza did not have a criminal record [0].

[0] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_lanza#Perpetrator

Can you please link to the indictment you saw (which the grand jury also saw and true billed)? I couldn't find it with a quick glance at the Comal County Court at Law Portal (I only found a Register of Actions).

I'm only referring to this article where they make that claim and a brief google of other news articles where they make the same claim. It's quite possible the journalists have all made factual errors - I can't find the indictment either but I just assumed indictments aren't usually public.

Well, people have children. The protection they feel must be absolute, and here is someone who threatening them.

If someone came up to me on the street and screamed I'm going to fucking kill you, I wouldn't argue for his freedom of speech.

I am probably instigating a flame ware...but I strongly disagree.

>here is someone who threatening them.

Threatening them, who is them? As deplorable as his speech was, it was not an identifiable threat of some imminent danger to some specific victim. (ie. I would have a different opinion if he identified a school by name). A counter-argument to my opinion is that we could have people making very real, but vague threats and police could not take action until after it is to late. However, there must be a balance between right to free speech and police powers, I just tend to err on the side of rights over government power.

>If someone came up to me on the street and screamed I'm going to fucking kill you, I wouldn't argue for his freedom of speech.

Your example is good because it can highlights where the law can strike a fair balance better rights and powers. First, I agree in your example I would not argue for right to free speech, but the declarant in the story is more akin to someone on the street screaming "I want to fucking kill someone" not directed at anyone and otherwise not posing an immanent threat.

If this kind of speech is to be punished with 8 years prison or 10 years probation, police just need to log onto Xbox Live and have a field day with all the threats...in fact one of the statements from the thread in this story "go drink bleach", I have only heard before on Xbox Live and I have heard it many times from various players - though this example is not a threat there are plenty to be found...mostly involving mothers.

I don't follow your first remark. Are you trying to say that because he said "kindergarten" instead of naming a specific kindergarten that it's no longer threatening or a threat?

It is still a threat under the definition, but because he said "kindergarten" instead of naming a specific kindergarten I am saying it is protected speech under the 1st Amendment.

There are exceptions, but generally, it is not criminal to discuss committing a crime, in order to constitute a crime there usually needs to be a substantial step in furtherance of committing the crime.

Yes exactly.

It's the difference between "I'm so angry I could kill someone right now!" and "I'm so angry I could kill so-and-so neighbor right now!"

There's also a huge difference between screaming the latter to unrelated people and screaming it to the so-and-so neighbor.

Not exactly. He didn't say he "could" shoot up a kindergarten, he said he was going to. Is there a difference between naming a specific kindergarten? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean only one of them is a threat.

In my example, both use the 'could.'

I really don't think that someone should be charged with 'making terroristic threats' - nor any kind of threats - with just a vague statement of intent.

He didn't threaten anyone's children. He threatened children as a concept in order to shock. Is the difference between shouting at someone that you are going to kill them and shouting that you could kill someone. The first is a specific threat, the second is the sort of thing that is said after a bad day at work.

If you took everyone seriously when they threatened non-specific murder, you would have to jail everyone who makes jokes about how many points you get for running over different kinds of pedestrians while driving, which at least in the UK seems to be around half of all drivers.

You just said "I'm going to fucking kill you." If context does not matter (which is the entire premise of this case), then you are just as guilty as Justin. Are you still so eager to police speech?

This distinction is entirely a matter of context. Which is the point — it is not the words themselves that are outlawed, but the act of threatening.

He didn't run up to someone in the street.

But even so, would you argue for 8 years in prison for screaming at someone?

The thing is that a true threat, something that is directed and credible, and forces someone to actually protect themselves against it, can be rightly criminalized by the states.

In other words, it isn't screaming at someone, it is a true and credible threat, that might be worth punishing relatively harshly.

Let me put this another way. Suppose instead of screaming at someone the individual went up to the home of a black family and burned a cross on their sidewalk (so no tresspassing) at 2am, and left a piece of cardboard on their door saying "Watch out. We are coming for you!" That's a pretty classic terroristic threat in US history. It may consist entirely of expressive acts and no real property crime. Certainly that's worthy of significant punishment.

Now this case doesn't even come close to that hypothetical and I think the differences are illustrative. It isn't specific. It isn't a threat directed at the target. It isn't disruptive by itself. So if the individual isn't taking any steps to make it happen, I think it really should fall in the category protected by Brandenburg v. Ohio. Indeed, if you read footnote 1 of that case, you will see that the speech at issue here was a lot less likely to cause imminent lawless action, was a lot less terroristic, and was a lot less credible than the speech found protected in that case.

> Well, people have children. The protection they feel must be absolute, and here is someone who threatening them.

Meh....

While I was driving my two kids to school today (in Jakarta), my youngest climbed on my lap. Where I am there are no laws against that, so I just kept driving.

I think it is interesting that the people I know who have no kids fit your view of looking for absolute protection more than the actual parents I know. There's a certain point where, as a parent, you come to terms with the fact that the world is a dangerous place.

> If someone came up to me on the street and screamed I'm going to fucking kill you, I wouldn't argue for his freedom of speech.

This would be true especially if you knew the person and had reason to believe that the individual really intended to do that.

On the other hand, if it was one of your bowling buddies you were slated to play with the next day and he came up to you and said, "Tomorrow, I am gonna fucking kill you with a 300!" I would totally say "free speech" and I wouldn't think he was going to bring over the elite Spartan guard and kill you with Greek swords or something.....

So these things require context.

And that's why context is important. This case is more similar to someone comes to the middle of a crowded park and just yell to the sky.

Because I'm scared.

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

I find the actions taken here infinitely more scary than facebook comment bullshit.

The average person does not make a cost-benefit analysis for things like this because that would require admitting that the question is complicated, or must result in some risk of death. Instead they silently drop the cost half of the equation by telling themselves that 0% risk of death must be possible, and rationalize away the costs of such a delusion by ignoring cases like this, or figuring that the victim must have deserved it somehow (with the silent assumption that nothing like this could ever happen to them or their loved ones).

In recent years Obama justified various state excesses by saying something like "You can't have 100% security and 100% privacy." My immediate thought was, "Well, that's vacuously true, because you can't have 100% security ever."

I think it's more that most people operate on the (apparently mistaken) assumption that the police are here to __protect__ us, and to find out who is guilty, while also exercising discretion and not prosecuting people who, paraphrasing the article, meant no harm but acted like an asshole. Thus, people figure that it's "better to be safe than sorry", and assume that the police and justice system will Find The Truth and sort things out.

Unfortunately, that's not the case: the job of the police seems to be to make a case, and when combined with the plea bargain system we have, it's basically a game of "how can we convict this guy".

Do I think investigation was warranted? Sure. But it definitely seems like overreaction to treat this as a valid terrorist threat, rather than a kid (or adult) saying something mean and flippant.

I also find it hard to believe that Facebook was "unable" to give details of the conversation. If the defense believes that the context (unshown in the screenshot) is important, I am surprised they can't subpoena the entire history of his actions in that timeframe, or of the threads he was posting in over that 48-hour period, and have an expert witness collect and show the context they say is so important.

IANAL and I am not 100% sure which part of the Stored Communciations Act covers the private messages. But either they need a search warrant or they just need to subpoena them (depending on which section applies). I suspect a search warrant is required for content but not 100% sure.

Now if they needed a search warrant (which is quite possible, if this was treated like email and less than 180 days old), then it is quite possible they asked for one and got laughed at by the magistrate.

More to the point, it seems that the police must skew towards that attempted 0% risk, which is what starts snowballs like this.

I find it ironic that with all of the talk flying around about nothing being private, a facebook conversation that would potentially exonerate this guy can't be dredged up.

It's hard for me to crystallize my thoughts on what needs to happen here, because the details, have up until this article, been incredibly confusing and contradictory. At the last report, this conversation took place within League of Legends itself. Apparently that wasn't the case. What other details about the information the jury had access to do we not know?