| Grand Jury Subpoenas Newspaper Site Commenters Info
Yet nother challenge to community anonymity |
rogerd
msg:3933510 | 1:40 pm on Jun 15, 2009 (gmt 0) |
| A federal grand jury has subpoenaed the names, phone numbers, IP addresses and other identifying information about every person who commented on the original article [about tax evasion], which appeared in the May 26 edition of the Las Vegas Review-Journal... It's not clear yet whether the matter will end up in court, but some legal experts say that the newspaper could mount a strong argument that the subpoena violates the people's free speech rights because it's too broad. |
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The article cites an earlier attempt to subpoena customer records from Amazon. In that case, a judge denied the federal government's request for the personal information of customers who had purchased a book by an author being investigated for tax fraud. While this current fishing expedition seems unlikely to go anywhere, I still think it is unwise to brag about illegal activity in a public forum. Story [mediapost.com]
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