woman who drove 13 year old to suicide, may get what she deserves...

[Dr. Hobo]

im surprised there wasnt a thread about this already so i started this..

the basic story:

megan meier was a 13 year old girl had a falling out with a former classmate. The mother of the girl who she had the falling out with, lori drew, created a fake myspace page of a boy, josh evans, (with her daughter and a employee at her company who was also a teen) who then "befriended" megan.

megan and the boy became close until "he turned on her" and told her "the world would be a better place without you" ... being 13 and suffering from clinical depression.. that was enough to set her off and for her to commit suicide.

within the past few days lori drew has been charged with on 4 federal counts:

Lori Drew was indicted this morning in Los Angeles on federal charges for fraudulently using an account on MySpace. The indictment charges Drew in four counts -- one count for conspiracy and three counts "for accessing protected computers without authorization to obtain information to inflict emotional distress," according to a press release. The latter charge relates to the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

for more detailed info one can hit up wired at the following pages:

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/0 ... indic.html
the indictment

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/0 ... -expe.html
more info about the story plus links at the bottom for more background info.

and now.. discuss

ps. the justice dept at the state and federal level has some work to do if the basis of the charges against this.. woman? monster? whatever.. are based on the terms of service contracts with myspace.

[Neil]

I honestly had not heard of this story until you posted it. Then again I've neglected watching the news as much as usual the last several days. This story floors me. The sad truth about it though is that this type of thing happens everywhere. Perhaps it doesn't end in suicide, obviously, or we would hear about it more.

The mother deserves to be punished. What has me amazed is that all four of her charges merely reflect on her actions of creating the false Myspace page. No charges of basic murder. Though it disgusts me, I understand why that is. Drew did not directly murder 13 year old Megan. The four charges brought against Drew are basically the easiest way for the prosecutors to hopefully get her found guilty.

What is going to really disgust all of us is the fact that this woman will not get the punishment she deserves. I have a feeling it will be easy as opposed to what she truely deserves for causing Megan to commit suicide. Very depressing.

[Lando]

I read about this a long time ago. I was disgusted.

[myownsatellite]

I heard about this back when it became a media frenzy at the beginning of the year. I was more disgusted by the fact that people were defending her, saying "she didn't mean to hurt the girl" and "well she was protecting her own daughter" and "why is it her fault the girl killed herself? That girl obviously had problems if she took an online relationship so seriously."

Well duh the girl had problems, but that woman exacerbated them to the point where an already-depressed teen decided that her life wasn't worth living anymore.

She should get the book thrown at her, and I won't be sorry when the jury finds her guilty. I just hope that she gets the max sentence. Maybe eventually they'll come to their senses and indict her for some sort of aggravated assault charge in the least, because she basically murdered that poor girl.

[Neil]

The max sentence still won't be what she deserved. These charges probably bring a max of five years each. It'll be bullshit.

[Johnny]

I doubt that she'll even get five years. She'll probably get a suspended sentence and a few hundred hours of community service.