Reading Boyfriends Email

[anson34]

my daughter's boyfriend opened his e-mail on her computer and left it open.  she read some of his messages.  there were several from girls with pictures attached(nudie pics).  of course she was furious. she contacted the girl to see what the deal was. his mother became involved and she then forwarded the pictures to her at her request.  she resides in Kentucky. i am worried that she may have broken the law.  did she? what kind of trouble can she be in?

[Arndell]

Good morning Darla,

If your boyfriend opened the e-mail and left it open on her computer that still does not give her authorization to open up messages and read the contents. What she did is called unauthorized access to computer and/or network. I would need to know what state you live in so I could researched the laws in your state. But I will tell you that in almost every state the statutes are fairly similar.

If you don't have expressed authorization to be in an account and read the contents of the account then it is called unauthorized access and generally a misdemeanor in most states. But the person whose account she accessed would have to press the charges against her. As she is I'm guessing a minor then I don't see how whole lot coming out of this even if she is charged.

I would not do any more reading or forwarding from the account and close it from your daughter's computer as soon as possible.

Unless this is reported to the police by the other party then nothing will probably ever come of it. But this is a really good opportunity for you to talk to your daughter about the dangers of the Internet and the fact that some people will do some of these things such as sending pictures that are inappropriate.

Speaking of that it just dawned on me, that if the girls in the pictures that you are talking about are under age, then they are considered child pornography possibly and if they are in the boys e-mail accounts that he could possibly be charged with possession of child pornography. What I would do is contact your local law enforcement agency ASAP, and report to the police exactly what happened but because of the type of contents that were observed you felt that it outweighed the fact that your daughter may have done something improper. I am willing to guess that law enforcement is not going to be very hard on your daughter at all especially since she is bringing to them the possibility of a very serious federal and or felony state crime. The sending of pictures of an underage minor to someone is a crime in the receiving of those pictures is a crime, and the possession of pictures of an underage minor that is considered either child pornography or improper is also a crime.

So call the police ASAP and inform them of what happened and let's see where it goes from there I think your daughter will be the least of their worries. Since she was not doing it at the direction of the police she cannot be considered a agent for the state, which is a defense sometimes for these types of things. But since she didn't independently and then notify the police what she found is admissible as evidence in a court of law.

Good luck, be safe, stay well. And please post a follow-up let me know how things go.