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	Author	Topic: Spouse email access leads to felony charge (Read 6474 times)
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BillV

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Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« on: January 05, 2011, 10:38:44 AM »

I thought this article was interesting. A man accessed his [now ex-]wifes email account (Ggmail) and is being charged with a felony. The defense lawyer is trying to argue over the definition of a "computer system" and "computer program" saying Gmail should not be considered either and because of that there is no basis for a charge. Interesting case.

Full Article Here


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Andrew Waite

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #1 on: January 05, 2011, 10:59:40 AM »

That seems like the defense lawyer is clutching at straws, I'll be interested to see how this plays out.

Unless I'm missing something (legalise isn't my specialty) Gmail is provided by some code (computer software) running on Google's systems (computer system), just because you (the user) can't physically touch the systems that the program is running on should change this.

Anyone got a different interpretation?


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chrisj

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #2 on: January 05, 2011, 12:08:50 PM »

I think that his argument should be more on the fact that it was a shared computer used by both of them at home, and that she had provided him with the password.

If my partner / spouse / room mate has access to my system, and my password. Then the fault is mine and not a case of unauthorized access to a computer.

But I'm not a Lawyer, I don't play one on tv, and think the case is bs.


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Ketchup

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #3 on: January 05, 2011, 02:04:47 PM »

I am with Chris on this one. It doesn't sound like the spouse took "reasonable" efforts to secure her email account. I am curious to see how this turns out. I have seen much crazier law suits that ended surprisingly.


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chrisj

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #4 on: January 05, 2011, 02:32:53 PM »

I've been told via Twitter that this should make this week's episode of HNN Cast. (Forwarded the link to them).


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chrisj

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #5 on: January 05, 2011, 02:44:25 PM »

Detroit Free Press article on the topic too:

http://www.freep.com/article/20101226/NEWS03/12260530/1011/NEWS09/


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Ketchup

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #6 on: January 05, 2011, 03:24:17 PM »

The poll results in the article seem to indicate that people consider this to be another frivolous lawsuit. I couldn't agree more.


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CadillacGolfer

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Re: Spouse email access leads to felony charge

« Reply #7 on: January 06, 2011, 04:10:59 PM »

I had a friend that got divorced last year. One day, while they were still married but seperated and heading toward divorce, he brought a laptop over to my house. They both used this laptop. He asked me to find information about his wife's affair in email or anywhere else on the laptop. I politely declined his request. No way I wanted to get involved in that.