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Judge Demands Email and Facebook Passwords From Women In Sexual Harassment Case
An anonymous reader writes "Back in September, a U.S. judge ruled that a school district violated the First Amendment (freedom of speech) and Fourth Amendment (unreasonable search and seizure) rights of a 12-year-old student by forcing her to hand over her Facebook password to school officials who in turn used it to search for messages they deemed inappropriate. This month, another U.S. judge has ordered that women suing their employer for sexual harassment must hand over cell phones, passwords to their email accounts, blogs, as well as to Facebook and other social networks."
Not at all.
If you are suing, then cell phones, Facebook and email are all part of the evidence in the case. Without reading the sepcifics I cannot tell you why the judge wanted it.
The teachers requiring a FB p/w were on a fishing expedition that went beyond the purview of their positions.
Usually in discovery you turn over data, often times even processed data (scans, copies, PDFs rather than original files).
Redactions are very common. Handing over 100% of communication, relevant or not, completely ubredacted is NOT how things are supposed to work.
note, always make sure to send a message to your lawyer with every account. They should then be able to argue that it contains priveledged info and needs to be turned over by the lawyer in a different format (not saying it will work, but It's worth a try).
Back when records were physical, lawyers were given temporary, unrestricted, but observed access to documents, and able to ask for broad sections to be copied and sent based on what they saw.
I think the facebook equivalent is to give access to the account supervised for x number of hours, and then allow requests to be made for all messages in this date range, or these people, etc.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
Actually, if you look at actual cases, it isn't a 'classical assumption' when it comes to sexual harassment suits. They tend to be a significant uphill battle with a lot of 'she is just sensitive, she is just selective, she is just taking advantage of the law' stuff thrown in.. it has disturbing similiarities to the arguments brought up to discredit rape victims.. including the BS 'but she uses that language' argument (which they seem to be fishing for here) since that is just a recasting of one of the common defenses against rape allegations.. 'well, she was a loose woman who slept around', as if somehow because she does something privately it means someone doing it to her non-consentually is ok.
You should RTFA.
One plaintiff is suing because of the word cunt. She can be seen wearing a shirt with the word cunt on it.
Various plaintiffs are suing because they were fired and can't find employment. There are messages sent between them indicating they actualyl had job offers.
There are also messages between the plaintiffs detailing their interactions with the defendants, their plans to sue, etc.
This isn't victim blaming, it's bog standard evidence discovery.