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mike470 5/15/08 9:19:47 PM
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Guide
Joined: 2/11/08
Currently on vacation---be back in a week..I know you will all miss me ;) |
LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- A Missouri mom was indicted Thursday for her alleged role in the death of a teen who killed herself over a failed Internet romance that turned out to be a hoax. 
Megan Meier, 13, hanged herself in her bedroom after being targeted in a MySpace hoax. A federal indictment accuses Lori Drew, 49, of O'Fallon, Missouri, of using the social networking Web site MySpace.com to pose as a 16-year-old boy and feign romantic interest in the girl. The girl, Megan Meier, committed suicide after her online love interest spurned her, according to prosecutors, telling her the world would be a better place without her. Drew faces up to 20 years in prison on charges of conspiracy and accessing protected computers to obtain information to inflict emotional distress. The indictment, which was filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, accuses Drew and others of registering on MySpace as "Josh Evans" and using the account to lure Meier into an an online romance. Authorities have previously said that Drew set up the account to find out what Meier, who lived in her neighborhood, was saying about her daughter. Prosecutors allege that Drew and the others violated MySpace's terms of service by using false information to create the account so they could "harass, abuse or harm" Meier, according to the indictment. The two corresponded for about four weeks before "Josh" broke off the relationship, authorities said. Within an hour, Meier hanged herself in her room and died the next day. The indictment does not allege that Drew sent the final message telling Meier the world would be a better place without her. Instead, it blames her unnamed co-conspirators, who authorities have previously said include a teenage girl. After Drew learned of the teen's suicide, the indictment alleges, she directed one of the teens involved to "keep her mouth shut" and deleted the account. Meier's mother, Tina Meier, told CNN in November that her daughter had self-esteem issues and had struggled with depression since childhood. She said when her daughter began receiving messages from "Josh" telling her she was pretty, she was thrilled. When "Josh" broke off the relationship, Tina Meier said, her daughter was devastated. "She was looking for me to help calm herself down like I always did and be there for her. And I was upset because I didn't like the language she was using, and I was angry she didn't sign off when I told her to," Tina Meier told CNN. "She said to me, 'You're supposed to be my mom, you're supposed to be on my side,' and then took off running upstairs," Tina Meier said. Tina Meier found her daughter hanging by a belt shortly afterward. "It's as if my daughter killed herself with a gun," Meier's father, Ron, told CNN. "And it's as if they loaded the gun for her." Drew is scheduled for arraignment in June. "This adult woman allegedly used the Internet to target a young teenage girl, with horrendous ramifications," U.S. Attorney Thomas P. O'Brien said in a written statement. "Any adult who uses the Internet or a social gathering Web site to bully or harass another person, particularly a young teenage girl, needs to realize that their actions can have serious consequences," O'Brien said. In December, Missouri prosecutors declined to file charges against Drew, saying there was no law under which she could be charged. "There is no way that anybody could know that talking to someone or saying that you're mean to your friends on the Internet would create a substantial risk," St. Charles County Prosecutor Jack Banas said. "Under the law, we just couldn't show that." |
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"Jealously leads to Anger, Anger leads to Hate, Hate leads to posting on mmorpg.com I blame WoW. " -SoulSurfer |
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Gameloading 5/15/08 9:39:47 PM
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Elite Member
Joined: 2/27/04 |
Again? sorry, but that story is really old. |
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Vendayn 5/15/08 9:43:08 PM
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Guide
Joined: 12/30/04
Ask a question and you are stupid for 30 seconds, never ask and you are stupid for life. |
Originally posted by Gameloading actually, you must have not read it. Or maybe you did, if so then sorry. The story is old...but the article is new. Before they didn't charge anyone with anything. Just recently they are trying to convict the ones who are guilty.
Anyway, I hope they get charged myself...its sad what happened. |
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| ------------------Signature----------------- My MMORPG.com blog: http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Vendayn |
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Arndur 5/15/08 10:37:25 PM
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Elite Member
Joined: 4/26/07
Hakkaa Päälle |
Originally posted by Vendayn
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| A prisoner of war is a man who tries to kill you and fails, and then asks you not to kill him.--Winston "Death had to take him sleeping, for if Roosevelt had been awake there would have been a fight." -unknown at Teddy Roosevelt's death
AMD 4800 2.4ghz-2GB RAM 800mhz-8500 GT 512mb-320gb HD |
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Tuor7 5/16/08 1:49:03 AM
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Elite Member
Joined: 3/09/06 |
This is ridiculous. Seriously. The primary person who should be blamed is the girl who offed herself. You could also blame the mother for knowingly allowing her kid to access a place she was too young to normally access. Is the woman who was involved with this a bad person? Yes, I would say so. Did she commit a crime? I don't think so. But, unsurprisingly, the government will try to twist existing laws to get the woman, not out of a sense of justice, but out of a desire to show it is "doing something". |
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beastliest21 5/16/08 3:10:46 AM
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Novice Member
Joined: 5/14/08 |
I don't think anyone under the age of 18 should be allowed in chat rooms of any kind .. including myspace. There is simply no way to stop what they are exposed to, there are always ways around every option out there. Is it illegal for someone to tell someone in person to go jump off a cliff? No. Why would that be illegal online? No that woman isn't a good person but I don't think she commited a crime, nor should they make it a crime. Parents need to be parents and stop letting their kids do whatever they want. The internet is not a babysitter and they need to stop expecting it to be. |
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Sheista 5/16/08 3:30:39 AM
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Hard Core Member
Joined: 9/30/05 |
Originally posted by Tuor7 Um, what? The girl was 13. That is an age where a person can be very easily influenced by others, -especially- an older boy claiming to be someone who cares about this person, and who the girl probably looked up to and confided a lot in. Just because she was young doesn't mean she didn't have real feelings and emotions involved in what was going on. While it is her fault to an extent, what the other mother did was extremely manipulative and twisted. She deserves every bit of jail time being considered right now. |
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Teala 5/16/08 4:10:43 AM
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Elite Member
Joined: 6/16/04
God made women because mens brains are broken. |
It is sad that something likethis even occured. :( |
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Tuor7 5/16/08 5:39:22 AM
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Elite Member
Joined: 3/09/06 |
No, she doesn't. Trying to bend existing laws in order to make an example out of something is not justice. What about the girl's mother? You know, the one that allowed her daughter to create the account and was supposedly monitoring it? You think someone goes from 0 to suicide in 60 seconds? Where was she? If she was monitoring what was going on, as she claims, then why didn't she step in? Oh, but we'll play "pass the buck" in the blame game so as not to have to live with the guilt that her daughter was HER responsibility: her's and her husband's. No, it's much better to blame someone else and go after them with a righteous fury. You think that woman was manipulative and bad? Have you COMPLETELY forgotten what middle and high school was like? Have you really forgotten the sorts of things that happened there? Maybe you got off without having to deal with that sort of thing, but few do. Kids are far more cruel to one another than adults. And I never said she didn't have "real feelings". I'm sure she did. We all do. Most of us don't kill ourselves when things go badly. Sorry, but IMO, this sort of thing is the result of a bad family environment: a healthy family ought to have seen the girl breaking down and come together to support her, this one obviously did not, despite the mother's claims of "monitoring" an account that she allowed her daughter to create in violation of the ToS. Pointing fingers wont change that. |
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mike470 5/16/08 8:33:00 AM
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