By Sarah Ruf | Maricopa Monitor
Lawyers met last week for a hearing in Pinal County Superior Court over how to deal with social media records in the case of San Tan Valley teen Tyler Kost.
On July 13, Judge Kevin White extended the deadline for prosecutors with the Pinal County Attorney’s Office to hand over Facebook records of 13 teens who say Kost either raped or sexually molested them at various times over a period of five years. An additional five girls who reported similar incidents declined to sign on to the case.
The state has 20 more days to round up the records at the request of Kost’s defense team, led by Michael Alarid III, who revealed in March that three of the alleged victims and three other teens talked about teaching Kost “a lesson” in a Facebook group chat message, with one girl writing “Yes!! I already know this is just gonna be so much fun!” in the exchange.
Comment by Rose Law Group Cyber Law Attorney Logan EIia:
This is clearly an issue where the courts need to carefully weigh privacy rights against the fundamental right to due process. In the end, I think this is a matter that needs to be addressed on a case-by-case basis. That is why we have people sitting as judges instead of computers.
We don’t want a system where people are afraid to report crimes lest their truly private lives become a matter for public scrutiny. Likewise, we do not want innocent people to be denied access to the evidence that proves their innocence.
In the end, I think we will find that Internet privacy is a myth. If you truly want something to remain a secret, do not write it down and electronically publish it.
