EFF Wins Me Over

Well, the EFF finally won me over. You see, the Supreme Judicial Court for Suffolk County ruled in their favor, ordering the police to return the homophobic hacker's computer equipment.

But the best part is that the EFF press writeup finally highlights the right issue. Smack dab in the first paragraph we get:

Not only is this an enormous victory for Calixte himself, but the ruling is also the highest state court opinion to repudiate the nascent law enforcement "trend" of charging internet users who violate websites' terms of service as criminals.

Calixte, recall, sent emails from Yahoo and Gmail which claimed to be from his roommate, announcing that the roommate was gay. The cops then nicked Calixte's stuff under an unauthorized use statute.

I am happy that the EFF is finally on the right track with this one. Heck, the EFF post even links to the same Volokh Conspiracy post I noted earlier. So good for them!

The court opinions are a little weird. You can read them here, as the April 22 Order Re: Motion and the May 21 Supreme Judicial Counsel Order. Both touch very briefly on the email/unauthorized use statute aspect of the case. Reading the Commonwealth's materials, the state didn't seem too interested in defending such an application of the law.