#22 You Guys Outsmarted The System
State law enforcement was trying to prosecute a local cop for accessing the name and address information of an individual in the State’s criminal justice computer system. They were trying to help a friend who was a process server. The State was prosecuting the cop for violating the computer crimes act, which, in part, makes it illegal to share any information which the State has an intellectual property interest in.
We showed up for the trial, having waived our right to a jury, and allowed the head of the Attorney General’s litigation department to make this wonderfully colorful speech about a police officer breaking the public trust and this other nonsense. For our opening statement, we moved to dismiss the indictment on the grounds that the State’s theory of the case was a legal impossibility.
The State cannot have an ownership interest in someone’s name or address. The judge was annoyed with our tactic and so he put the screws to us by asking dozens of questions, but we kept repeating our theory: the State cannot own a name or address as intellectual property. Finally, the judge got it and turned to question the Attorney General. He tried to dance his way out of answering the big question all sorts of ways.
Eventually, the judge flat out asked him if he contended that the State can own someone’s name or address. The AG responded by saying, “Judge, I came here to try a case, not to argue the law.” The judge was not impressed. He dismissed the case immediately and wrote a letter to the Attorney General asking him to be more selective in his prosecutions. That was a fun day in court.
Credit: crimsonlaw
