Social network sites and inaccurate profiles - fraudulent behaviour?

This is a story from the US about a girl who killed herself after being dumped by her online boyfriend. It turns out the boyfriend wasn't a boy but the mother of a former friend of the girl - posing as a boy.

MySpace is domiciled in California, so an LA court has jurisdiction (MySpace being the victim in the case), and the prosecutors are looking for any law that was broken by the perp (heh, it's a US case so I'm using the appropriate lingo).

It seems the most likely action would be one for fraud - on the basis that the former friend's mother acted fraudulently towards MySpace in setting up an account with false details. If succesful it could ultimately lead to former friend's mother being responsible for girl's death. Whilst I seriously doubt it would get that far, it would be interesting to see if any charges are actually made - if there are I'll certainly be trying to remember to keep an eye on the trial....

And on a non-legal note, I was chatting to my mother last night and she was talking about MyFace. Which I initially thought was a Spoonerism, but turns out not to be.

***********************************

Update -

I have found a different report which contains more details on the social aspects, but also explains how MySpace would be the victim. And here's the link.

Bloody First Great Western

Is the sole train operator which goes to Town where I work, and it is unmitigated pants.

On 1 January the train fare went up by over 8% for my route. Whilst high, this is not the highest increase Frantically Grabbing Wonga has implemented; London to Maidenhead is apparently so expensive that a passenger group ,"More Trains Less Strain", has claimed that it is cheaper to buddy-up and catch a cab between the two locations (following a 9.65% increase in fares) (story in Times Online).

If the FGW service was better than average, hell - even just bog-standard average, that would be one thing. However, FGW is the worst performing British train service and nearly one in five trains is late. That means twice a week my train will not arrive on time. On my outbound journey I take two tube lines, a FGW train, then a bus. On my inbound journey, the same in reverse. Since the new year my average commute has jumped to three hours daily. In the interests of fairness I should point out that the delay isn't always train related - if the trains are running OK then there's always the possibility of signal problems or suspended services on one of the tube lines that I also use.

Today the results of an RMT strike ballot have been published. Unsurprisingly the results are overwhelmingly in favour of a strike. The reason is that FGW wants to try to operate a commercial (ha!) seven-day service (bless) but the FGW guards don't want to work Sundays. The RMT union position is that "guards can choose not to attend on Sundays" (in the words of a Worst Great Western rep).

It is likely there will be some buggering around with the trains then and it could be as early as next week. It might be they call a strike, or take some action "short of strike" which was apparently one of the options in the ballot of RMT's FGW members. Whichever day it is, I'll work at home.

Unless it's after next Thursday because that's when we get our new car.

year and a day rule

This rule set out that if you injured someone and they died in excess of a year and a day after the injuries were inflicted you couldn't be charged with murder, and it was abolished over ten years ago.

Considering the year and a day rule came into force initially in the thirteenth century I feel it showed an impressive grasp of remoteness of causation. Similarly, I felt that Michael Howard was correct in repealing it, given the advances of modern science. I'll leave for another time the suggestion that it should be re-introduced with an amendment to the effect that if the victim survives a year and a day following the injury in an NHS establishment without experiencing complications related to the contraction of a superbug in hospital then the perpetrator can't be charged because the victim is clearly uncommonly lucky (and should buy some lotto tickets pronto).

In the first few days of law school, coming up on ten years ago, we had an exercise in legal reading involving a snippet of legislation related to this rule. We had to work out what the rule actually meant and whether it was still in force or not. I occasionally remember how I felt, sat in our lecture theatre one morning (which was itself noteworthy), eager and full of optimism and enthusiasm about being a lawyer. I sometimes wish all the legislation I had to read was that straightforward.

Recently the BBC published an article which included a list of cases where the abolition of the rule has led to people being charged and convicted of murder since the abolition of the law in 1996.

Rights of owls and pussycats remain unaffected. Relief all around!