Detention for posts on Facebook
A DUNEDIN woman has been convicted under cyberbullying laws after outing a sex offender on Facebook.
Patricia Jane Millman (48) had a longstanding dispute with the victim following a landlordtenant relationship which had soured a decade earlier.
While browsing the socialmedia site Facebook on May 2, the defendant noticed someone had posted a complaint about the victim in reference to his business.
Millman ‘‘took the ball and ran with it’’, Judge Jonathan Krebs told the Dunedin District Court this week.
She added to the thread previous names the victim had used, said he had trashed her rental property and owed her $14,000 and had ripped off various companies for $125,000.
Most significantly Millman also wrote that the man had been ‘‘in and out of jail most of his life’’ and was a sex offender.
Defence counsel Sarah SaundersonWarner told the court the comments her client made had been true but accepted it did not justify her behaviour.
Millman followed it up with a photo of the victim’s work vehicle parked in front of his house.
‘‘Where does he live?’’ asked another user.
The defendant said she would private message them.
Ms SaundersonWarner said the photo was deleted shortly after it was posted, but that did not shield the victim from public backlash.
Judge Jonathan Krebs said the man had suffered significantly as a result of the post.
He had been threatened with physical violence and people had turned up at his home spouting verbal abuse.
The fiasco had also resulted in his business suffering.
‘‘All because you took the spontaneous decision to climb in,’’ the judge said.
‘‘That’s nasty behaviour.’’ Judge Krebs indicated he had originally planned to sentence Millman to home detention but Ms SaundersonWarner argued that would effectively end her work as a care giver.
She was the main breadwinner for the family, she stressed.
Millman was convicted under the Harmful Digital Communications Act and sentenced to four months’ community detention and 80 hours’ community work.