Alleged MySpace 'cyber-bully' indicted in teen's suicide

This story is so sad.

13 years old? hanging?? MySpace is dropping hard in the coolness factor. Poor soul.

I saw this story on the news a while back. Unbelievable! You know, I always choose to have faith in our species but hearing about this kind of stuff really makes me worry. What is the matter with that woman?! I can't even imagine how the teenage girl's parents are feeling.

I guess the word "overkill" on the revenge really fits here for anything hurt feelings

Well, really shows how emotionally unstable some myspace users are.

I doubt the woman is the only one to blame - obviously what she did was horribly wrong, and I am in no way trying to justify her actions. However, there must have been other issues in the girls life, other people that contributed to her decision of suicide.

WOW! people are taking this WAAAY too far! if your having problems in you own life you don't take it out on others by cyber bulling! you don't take it out on bulling in general. it gets people know were it just inflicts pain on people.

this is new news the person behind it atlest. find it interesting .

american teens
seems to either want to be getting fucked up , fucking , or sitting infront of a lighting up box or something . that dosnt involve using there brain the slightest bit . ( IF THEY EVEN GET A CHANCE TO DO SOMETHING IN THE WORLD)

people today realy make me worried about the future .
some biggest concern is howdeep mommies and daddies pockets still are


but , maybe

if the girl and the old lady . would have a life

none of this would of happend . if social networking and technology abroad wasn;t ruining these people lives and they would simply injoy something simple .


"blow up your car RIDE A BIKE"

I doubt the means she used would make much difference in the long run since 1 would be dead and 1 would still be in jail.

What if that woman was more directly involved in her revenge? If she blew up the teen while she was on her bike? Or ran her over with her car while the teen was riding her bike?

The major difference was it was harder to get caught and made her suffer a lot longer by using MySpace

LA has rednecks too .

That’s a crazy story. I don’t know how I should look at it I do know its screwed up that a little kid hung herself. However I’m having trouble with the rest of it. Do kids really care that much about the interactions they have on myspace? I have a myspace and face book account but I honestly don’t use it. Its just not important to me. I’d rather meet people face to face then bullshit through a website.

So am I just out of touch with the perspectives of the younger generations? I’m 23 and I get what myspace and face book are all about but it seems so crazy to think someone could actually be bullied to death via the internet. I guess it is a possibly, the kid was thirteen. At the same time its just strange to thing people could really care that much about someone they have never met.

Damn you Julie and your thought provoking story! I mean thank you Julie that was very kind of you.

CYBER BULLYING

Do we all buy into Fox Noise soundbytes now?

Yes, the woman is terrible. Beyond that, who cares? The girl killed herself, no one killed her. She made the choice.

At 13 years old, you are rational enough to know that killing yourself over something like that is completely stupid.

This breaks my heart. It's bad enough when kids bully each other, but a grown woman?! Sick.

This is so very sad.

I completely agree Saladin. I, for one, have no sympathy for this girl. Because this girl didn't have enough common sense to ignore the messages, she just helped the human race by removing herself from the gene pool. Thank you Darwin.

I don't think this woman drove her to suicide. I think other factors played a role into the young 13 year old committing suicide. This is sad no doubt about it, but that doesn't mean all teenagers who are bullied on the internet will somehow commit suicide, the world doesn't work like that. Should the lady be punished? Yeah for sure, but that doesn't make this entirely her fault for someone hating themselves so much to take their own life.

That's actually a really interesting legal question, it's not clear whether she should be punished or not.

It's not against the law to lie or to be mean to people, even if it leads to them committing suicide. Harassment is a different story, but there are already laws about that.

Think about it, do we really want to be prosecuted for what we say? Personally, I say no. We should be prosecuted for our actions, not our words.

It may seem like a trivial distinction, but it's actually tremendously important. If someone yells fire in a theatre and no one gets hurt, they should not be prosecuted for that.

You should give that some thought tanyetta before you ask for punishment. Would you want to be punished for something you didn't actually do? Should all bullies at school be thrown in prison for driving someone to suicide?

It's important to recognize that the decisions made in these cases affect how people will be prosecuted in the future.

Saladin- Thanks for calling me out on my word choice, so let me change my question. Should the lady hold herself accountable for her actions? Then fill in the rest of my statement.

stop ur makin me cry. im takin u to court.

Was there any need to do that, I mean what did that awful woman hope to gain. She's a nasty piece of work. And that poor girl, a life wasted.

Should the lady hold herself accountable? Well, to be honest, it makes no difference.

I'm not exactly sure what your question is. Do you mean to say that if she came out and claimed responsibility for her actions she should be prosecuted? Or do you mean to say that she should just take responsibility for what she's done?

In either case, I would say that it isn't really relevant. If we are talking about law, it makes no difference what she thinks. It matters if we want to punish her for it under the law.

On a social side, whether or not she claims responsibility changes nothing. She's still pretty much a total douche, and it doesn't change the situation.

The conspiracy charges here are valid, but I think the real question facing Americans is are we becoming a society that throws people in jail at the slightest provocation? While the conspiracy claims are legitimate, what the hell does it mean to commit an "unauthorized use of computers to inflict emotional distress?" Is that the kind of society we want?

take responsibility for what she's done. I said punished in an unclear way, I didn't mean punish by law, I meant punish by life. if you understand what I am saying. I should of stated my views clearly and not let my views be subjected to rebuttals, but I like your rebuttals because I am thinking. In my opinion every one has free will to kill, lie or steal or even commit suicide. With knowing that you can't blame anyone for your actions. Only you can blame yourself, but what the law will do to the lady I don't know. I just have to see it played out first.

I'm truly appalled by some the responses I've seen on this forum. You really think a 13 year old suicide "made a choice" and that at 13, she was "rational enough to know that killing yourself over something like that is completely stupid." Bullshit. The 49-year old woman should know that the emotional stability of a young teenager is vastly different than a mature adult and that she, as the elder party, was intentionally inflicting emotional pain on one more susceptible than herself.

Furthermore, it just shows how ignorant some of you are about depression or bipolar disorder, two factors that may have been a part of this tragedy. I'm sick of people saying to those that are depressed to, "Just get well" or "Be happy." You don't tell a cancer patient to "Be healthy." Depression is a mental disorder that should be treated with medication and/or therapy. It's not just a simple command-and-obey thing.

If this teenager was suffering from depression as a result of the actions of this 49-year old woman, we can't pass judgement on the young girl's unfortunate demise by declaring she was "irrational" and "stupid." Rationality cannot be applied on the same level AT ALL to this teenager as it would be to a normal, emotionally-in-charge adult.

In dealing with internet harrasment, laws need to be revised.

For much of the internet's history the adage of "it's just the internet, it's not real" has been used to simply blow off incidents that happen in cyberspace which had they occured offline would lead to alot of legal action.

But this incident shows that the old adage of it not being real is going out the window as stalkers and abusers taunt and torment their chosen victims in order to goad them into irrational decisions. The woman should be prosecuted for the events that directly led to this girl's suicide. If this woman had not pursued this line of action, would the suicide had ever occurred?

cyber bullying! Who makes this stuff up? While what the woman did is reprehensible, I don't see ANY crime. Of course, I don't see a crime in mere words. Acts I have a problem with but since freedom only ends at another persons nose I see no crime in words. If I were on the jury I would vote for aquittal.
Stupid

The woman assumed a false identity, flirted with the girl, played with her emotions, decided that she was going to dump her, and then systematically tear her down with nasty messages. The girl was 13. Maybe some of you forget what its like to be 13, but you are at your most vulnerable and impressionable. To be an adult woman and engaging in such a malicious kind of act is....malicious. We don't know what this girl was going through at home, and just maybe, for the first time, she thought she found someone who liked her, and could understand her. For all of that to suddenly turn upside down would be extremely upsetting, and just because that grown ass woman didn't wrap the rope around her neck, she certainly aided such a reaction.

She was somebody's daughter, and if it was yours, you'd want this woman to pay for her part in this. Perhaps the accused woman would do society a favor by removing herself also, as Acoitus suggests Megan did for us.

This is really sad.

As if being a teenager is not akward and confusing enough on its own you have situations like this coming up.

A fully grown adult took advantage of her previous knowledge on the teen's mental stability, she was taking meds for depression and ADHD, and used it to exact revenge.

Seriously, if two kids don't get along anymore be there to console them and remind them how big the world is, not stalk and harass the other kid.

Some say they are scared of the future generations, but damn I think I'm scared of some of the older ones.

Should this woman really be charges with anything - CAN she be charged with anything? I mean if it is to be taken that far, that one can be charged for the death of someone when you did not "pull the trigger" or plan the death what kind of conviction would this get? What precedent would this imply - if there was a school shooting, would the shooters be charged or the kids who bullied the shooters? I hope the court considers what they are doing.

The charges are for illegally accessing information on private systems not for the actual death. In the past these charges were used to charge hackers causing criminal activities through accessing private networks.

It is a sad story, and Thereishope raises some interesting ideas.

I know one thing for sure, it's a legal minefield.

I am appalled. A 49-year-old??? WTF?????

And she's not being charged with murder. She's being charged with intent to inflict emotional distress. That seems a no-brainer.

I guess if they start charging her directly for her murder it's just gonna open a legal can of worms. I ain't saying she's not responsible, or that she is, but it must be hard for the family knowing that she's getting a seemingly insignificant sentence.

Myspace is not the problem. Bullying is. I knew a guy at school whos brother hung himself due to bullying before the internet was even a thought of.

tackle the problem not the source.

If our generations parents are resorting to this to deal with bullying, then I will LOVE to see what the next gen will do. And friend sites aren't the problem.

this is same as the parents blaming "emo" music as the reason why their daughter commited suicide.

RIP

Hannah & Megan

(They both hung them selves)

You know it's probably just another case of internet adiction. Although this is sad for the family and for the loss of human life, it's almost worse because it just shows where we are as a nation.

49 years old?! That's pathetic. It's a shame that this ended so tragically over such idiocy.

a 49 year old deceiving a teenage. the human brain grows until about the age of 21, so this girl did not have all the mental/emotional "tools" that adults have to deal with life's complexities.

at the very least, this is emotional/mental abuse of a "child".

what a low life 49 year old, nothing better to do, then mess around with teenagers online. some people reach physical adult maturity, but not mental/emotional.

In America we have "road rage" who use the car as a weapon on others and now we have internet sociopaths that use the internet as a weapon to inflict injury on others. These people should be treated like pedophiles when they do this behavior and banned from blog sites forever.