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New Jersey Prosecutors Drop Charges Over Tweeting a Cop’s Photo [Updated]

posted by Fnord666 on Sunday August 09 2020, @02:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the chilling-effect dept.

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for nutherguy:

New Jersey prosecutors drop charges over tweeting a cop's photo [Updated]:

Update (~4pm ET): Mid-afternoon on Friday, August 7, the Essex County Prosecutor's Office dropped its cyber harassment charges against all five defendants, the Asbury Park Press reports. These charges stemmed from an incident involving a Tweet attempting to identify a New Jersey police officer. Our original story on the situation appears unchanged below.

A New Jersey man is facing felony charges for a tweet seeking to identify a police officer. Four others are facing felony charges for retweeting the tweet, the Washington Post reports.

[...] The complaint against Sziszak claims that the tweet caused the officer to "fear that harm will come to himself, family, and property."

"As a 20 year old that simply retweeted a tweet to help my friend, I am now at risk of giving up my career, serving time, and having a record," Sziszak wrote.

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 09 2020, @06:24PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 09 2020, @06:24PM (#1033927)

    What I find interesting is the quote

    "As a 20 year old that simply retweeted a tweet to help my friend, I am now at risk of giving up my career, serving time, and having a record," Sziszak wrote.

    It should not be a surprise to anyone that your actions online are not exempt from the law and your published words online carry more weight than they do in a casual private conversation. Lucky for him in this case it didn't, but there is no doubt you can get in trouble for retweeting something. You could be charged with harrassment or you could be aiding a criminal act if someone took it physical and you was involved in doxxing.