Big Win for AJ/Williams today.
The defense team for former star University of Tennessee linebacker A. J. Johnson and a teammate scored a legal touchdown Wednesday, winning access to the text messages and social media of their accusers.
The Tennessee Supreme Court on shot down the state’s appeal of a legally groundbreaking ruling by a lower court in the rape case filed against Johnson and former teammate Michael Williams.
The high court’s decision means that ruling becomes the law of land in Tennessee and brings the law in line with society’s new age of communication via text messaging, web applications and social media.
Players: Social media could exonerate
Johnson and Williams contend their accuser is lying and what she and her friends said via the Internet before and after the alleged November 2014 rape will help prove it. But the law didn’t address that kind of talk, and police didn’t preserve any of that Internet-based chatter. When attorneys for the two ex-players tried to get that information from the accuser and her friends via a subpoena, the state balked, saying the law didn’t allow it.
On paper, the state was correct. There was no mention of Internet-based communication in the law on defense subpoenas. But the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals said talk is talk, whether through traditional means of recorded statements, handwritten notes and testimony or today’s methods of text messages, Snapchats, tweets and Facebook posts and messages.
If police don’t bother to get all that Internet-based chatter, the court ruled, the defense has the right to go after it under the same laws at play for the traditional talk. That was legally groundbreaking in and of itself, opening the door for the accused statewide to seek such information when deemed material and relevant.
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The defense team for former star University of Tennessee linebacker A. J. Johnson and a teammate scored a legal touchdown Wednesday, winning access to the text messages and social media of their accusers.
The Tennessee Supreme Court on shot down the state’s appeal of a legally groundbreaking ruling by a lower court in the rape case filed against Johnson and former teammate Michael Williams.
The high court’s decision means that ruling becomes the law of land in Tennessee and brings the law in line with society’s new age of communication via text messaging, web applications and social media.
Players: Social media could exonerate
Johnson and Williams contend their accuser is lying and what she and her friends said via the Internet before and after the alleged November 2014 rape will help prove it. But the law didn’t address that kind of talk, and police didn’t preserve any of that Internet-based chatter. When attorneys for the two ex-players tried to get that information from the accuser and her friends via a subpoena, the state balked, saying the law didn’t allow it.
On paper, the state was correct. There was no mention of Internet-based communication in the law on defense subpoenas. But the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals said talk is talk, whether through traditional means of recorded statements, handwritten notes and testimony or today’s methods of text messages, Snapchats, tweets and Facebook posts and messages.
If police don’t bother to get all that Internet-based chatter, the court ruled, the defense has the right to go after it under the same laws at play for the traditional talk. That was legally groundbreaking in and of itself, opening the door for the accused statewide to seek such information when deemed material and relevant.
LEARN MORE
TWEETLINKEDINCOMMENTEMAIL
The defense team for former star University of Tennessee linebacker A. J. Johnson and a teammate scored a legal touchdown Wednesday, winning access to the text messages and social media of their accusers.
The Tennessee Supreme Court on shot down the state’s appeal of a legally groundbreaking ruling by a lower court in the rape case filed against Johnson and former teammate Michael Williams.
The high court’s decision means that ruling becomes the law of land in Tennessee and brings the law in line with society’s new age of communication via text messaging, web applications and social media.
Players: Social media could exonerate
Johnson and Williams contend their accuser is lying and what she and her friends said via the Internet before and after the alleged November 2014 rape will help prove it. But the law didn’t address that kind of talk, and police didn’t preserve any of that Internet-based chatter. When attorneys for the two ex-players tried to get that information from the accuser and her friends via a subpoena, the state balked, saying the law didn’t allow it.
On paper, the state was correct. There was no mention of Internet-based communication in the law on defense subpoenas. But the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals said talk is talk, whether through traditional means of recorded statements, handwritten notes and testimony or today’s methods of text messages, Snapchats, tweets and Facebook posts and messages.
If police don’t bother to get all that Internet-based chatter, the court ruled, the defense has the right to go after it under the same laws at play for the traditional talk. That was legally groundbreaking in and of itself, opening the door for the accused statewide to seek such information when deemed material and relevant.
LEARN MORE
TWEETLINKEDINCOMMENTEMAIL
The defense team for former star University of Tennessee linebacker A. J. Johnson and a teammate scored a legal touchdown Wednesday, winning access to the text messages and social media of their accusers.
The Tennessee Supreme Court on shot down the state’s appeal of a legally groundbreaking ruling by a lower court in the rape case filed against Johnson and former teammate Michael Williams.
The high court’s decision means that ruling becomes the law of land in Tennessee and brings the law in line with society’s new age of communication via text messaging, web applications and social media.
Players: Social media could exonerate
Johnson and Williams contend their accuser is lying and what she and her friends said via the Internet before and after the alleged November 2014 rape will help prove it. But the law didn’t address that kind of talk, and police didn’t preserve any of that Internet-based chatter. When attorneys for the two ex-players tried to get that information from the accuser and her friends via a subpoena, the state balked, saying the law didn’t allow it.
On paper, the state was correct. There was no mention of Internet-based communication in the law on defense subpoenas. But the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals said talk is talk, whether through traditional means of recorded statements, handwritten notes and testimony or today’s methods of text messages, Snapchats, tweets and Facebook posts and messages.
If police don’t bother to get all that Internet-based chatter, the court ruled, the defense has the right to go after it under the same laws at play for the traditional talk. That was legally groundbreaking in and of itself, opening the door for the accused statewide to seek such information when deemed material and relevant.
LEARN MORE
TWEETLINKEDINCOMMENTEMAIL
