IP: Utah arrests student publisher, plans to charge criminal libel

[Dave Farber <farber@cis.upenn.edu>]

>Date: Mon, 05 Jun 2000 12:48:32 -0400
>To: politech@vorlon.mit.edu
>From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com>
>
>[Let me see if I get this right. A California teenager is transplanted to 
>Utah and doesn't quite fit in at his new school. Some of his enemies set 
>up a web site. He replies with his own anonymous site, praising some 
>teachers and students and denouncing others. In response, the Utah police 
>raid his home, put him in jail for seven days, and now plan to charge him 
>with criminal libel. This notwithstanding the fact that one of the most 
>celebrated cases in U.S. legal history dealt with how Peter Zenger escaped 
>criminal libel charges. --Declan]
>
>**********
>
>My article on a very similar 1997 case dealing with criminal libel charges 
>brought against high school students:
>http://www.time.com/time/digital/daily/0,2822,12129,00.html
>
>Slashdot thread:
>http://slashdot.org/features/00/06/01/1526235.shtml
>
>Zenger case background:
>http://www.sar.org/newslett/Zenger.txt
>
>*********
>
>http://www.sltrib.com/05282000/utah/52983.htm
>
>Salt Lake Tribune
>By Joe Baird
>
>    MILFORD Ian Michael Lake didn't fit in this southwest Utah
>railroad town. On that everyone in this close-knit community of
>1,500 can agree. And most believe the Milford High School junior
>crossed a line when he posted a Web site disparaging faculty
>members and classmates in graphically vulgar terms.
>     But there is serious and, perhaps, litigious disagreement
>developing over how he became marginalized and whether Lake's
>inflammatory home page merited the seizure of his home computer
>and seven nights in a juvenile detention facility. There is also the
>question of the constitutionality of criminal libel charges he may
>soon face.
>
>[...]
>
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