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NY Magistrate: Legal Papers Can Be Served Via Facebook
New submitter Wylde Stile writes with an interesting case that shows just how pervasive social networking connections have become, including in the eyes of the law. A Staten Island, NY family court support magistrate allowed a Noel Biscoch to serve his ex-wife legal papers via Facebook. Biscoch tried to serve his ex-wife Anna Maria Antigua the old-fashioned way — in person and via postal mail — but his ex-wife had moved with no forwarding address. Antigua maintains an active Facebook account, though, and had even liked some photos on the Biscoch's present wife's Facebook page days before the ruling. The magistrate concluded that the ex-wife could be served through Facebook. If this catches on, I bet a lot of people will end up with legally binding notices caught by spam filters or in their Facebook accounts' "Other" folders.
... it went into my Other folder! No-one checks that!
... wait, what?
This is just so astoundingly absurd on so many levels I'm at a loss for words.
If legal documents can be sent over Facebook, then shouldn't communications on Facebook be regulated under the FCC telecommunications act?
This would include that private messages sent over Facebook may not be inspected by Facebook, and may not be used for targeted ads.
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
Facebook stopped being something you wanted to be on when your aunts and uncles started making accounts.
Facebook stopped being something you wanted to be on when your boss/employer started checking it.
Facebook stopped being something you wanted to be on when the government started sniffing around it for information about you.
Facebook stopped being something you wanted to be on when judges decided it was a reasonable means to serve legal documents.
Get off facebook... it is only down hill from here.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
This is, I think, the key line in TFA:
> A Family Court official ruled that Noel Biscocho could use Facebook to serve Anna Maria Antigua because other, more traditional methods to slap her with papers have not worked.
Historically, when the defendant absolutely cannot be reached any other way, the service of last resort was to put a classified ad in the "legal notices" section of the newspaper. In order for a judge to accept that, you had to show that you didn't know where the person lived or worked, and had no reasonable means of finding out. It seems to me that in case like this, delivery via the person's _active_ Facebook account is much better than a classified ad,and may well be the best available method of reaching the person.
papers can be served via electronic means, the burden of proof is on the service agent to prove service (via read receipt or screenshot showing that the document has been received by the other party - both of which technically possible on facebook).Service by post is possible, for those in doubt about that, but proof of posting is NOT proof of receipt. In that case, only a signature on a notice of service (or a recorded delivery docket) is sufficient.
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Papers are often served via the US Mail. FCC has no jurisdiction. Papers are often served at "last and usual," jargon for the place where the person is believed to have resided most recently. FCC has no jurisdiction over the front door. Contrary to film noir movies, papers are only occasionally served "in hand" where the process server physically hands the documents to the person of interest. Of course, the FCC has no jurisdiction there either.
In short, the FCC has absolutely nothing to do with this.
Source: I am a process server.
Support a few technologists in Washington.
Or you could do as I do, and NEVER sign for ANY certified mail.
People like me are the reason subpoenas MUST be delivered by an officer of the court.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
The gentleman in question was going to court to end the court order requiring him to pay child support payments for his now 21 year old son. It seems to me that a better solution would have been for the judge to issue an order to the provide the address for the account where the child support payments were being deposited. Followed up by an order suspending the payments if the ex-wife was not at that address until such a time as an actual address was found (the logic being that if the address the account was registered at was not at that address, then there was reason to believe that the account was actually being used by someone else). Confirmation of the correct account being found would come in the form of the court papers being served. Further the court could have ruled that the suspended child support payments would only be due if the court found in the ex-wife's favor on the petition which the man had made.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
1) Find wife's FB password.
2) Keep account active by visiting pages and liking stuff.
3) Get judge to agree to serve legal papers via FB.
4) Profit!
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
It's technically a federal crime to access someone else's FB account without permission, even if it's your wife and she leaves a post-it with her password at her computer.
I seem to recall, back in the original People's Court series, some defendant using that same line, and the judge was both incredulous and unimpressed (in the legal sense).
With registered mail, some post office employee would write down that they tried to deliver the mail, went to the right address, and the person there refused to sign. The court doesn't care that the person didn't receive the mail, as long as they could have received it if they hadn't acted like a dumbs.
Anything done on a computer is a crime under CFAA, if the prosecutor wants it to be. And if you make a fake FB account to deceive a judge and lie in court about it, you'll get the Aaron Swartz "hacker" treatment.
The judge may have said it can be used in this one case, but unless struck down by another court, it sets up a precedent for other judges to do the same.
The precedent is already there. (Leaving aside issues of which precedent is binding v. persuasive v. nobody cares).
Service by publication--you just put ads in generally available newspapers--is allowed in some courts when you can't reach a person, a leftover from the days when people read newspapers.
A few years ago slashdot posted an article when a judge allowed service by *email*. The reasoning was that an email to the person was more likely to reach them than service by publication, which would have been allowed.
When service by publication would be permissible, most savvy judges are likely to allow service by email, if it is within their discretion to allow it.
Suppose you go into court and there is no representative of the other party. if you can prove the notice was served, you can ask for declaratory judgement. Get FacedBook does not have return receipt functionality, unlike almost all email clients. barring a reply such as "you suck skunks," you can't prove service. this is no better than tying the subpoena to a flaming arrow and shooting it into a tree.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Here in divorce-centric NY, they WILL find ways to serve papers on you. Having a GOOD lawyer who knows state law helps. The judicial system doesn't approve of evaders.
When I filed for divorce in NY (I'll be very brief), my master manipulator STBX evaded the servers. She was an ex-deputy of the Sheriff department and learned of papers through the "old boy network". When she was at home she parked the car at an undisclosed location and no one answered the door. She was known to wear wigs for disguise and they could not find her on campus. All the places and events she was known to frequent, she could not be found.
The judge heard testimony from the servers that they were unable to serve papers on her after six months of trying. My lawyer and the judge had never seen a case this bad. At that time, she told me to contact her through her mother. I had a GOOD lawyer and he cited NY state law that in the event that a family member has been designated a contact, then papers can be served on that family member.
My mother-in-law never even knew we were separated and she went through the roof when she got the papers. Then the very next day her lawyer responds, and this timing of events was used in my trial before a very impressed judge.
Without going into details, the whole episode stretched out years longer than it should had for a simple divorce case and the judge cited her intentional abuse of the legal system in his ruling to prolong the process.
Did it end there? Nooooo.... when I found a buyer for the marital residence she refused to sign the papers, in violation of the stipulation. The same judge, with my divorce case fresh in his memory, wanted that broad in his court in two weeks. She was working at a state camp for the summer and I provided precise directions of the location of this camp for the server. Knowing her tactics, he posed as a delivery person carrying a parcel that required her signature. He delivered the parcel - and the papers. She never expected it, and probably forgot that years ago I wrote down those instructions when she called me out to that camp because her car broke down.
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