As you might’ve heard, a 14 year old Travis County female and her parents are suing MySpace and News Corp. for $30 million, claiming the social networking site provided the means with which she met a 19 year old guy that sexually assaulted her. Time’s Hillary Hylton reports the alleged predator plans legal action of his own.
The defense attorney for Pete Solis (above), the 19-year-old Texas community college student charged with sexually assaulting the girl dubbed “Julie Doe” in her lawsuit, told TIME that if the Texas courts accept the premise that MySpace is liable because the two met there, then his client also has a claim, since the alleged victim falsely portrayed herself on the webiste as 15 years old.
“He’s been, in effect, just as much a victim ” if not more,” says Adam Reposa, the attorney for Solis, who is facing up to 20 years in prison on charges of second degree felony sexual assault. Since the lawsuit against MySpace also names Solis as a defendant, Reposa said he will “cross-file” and also sue MySpace and its owner, News Corporation. “MySpace wasn’t there when they went to Whataburger. MySpace wasn’t there when they went to the movie and MySpace wasn’t there when they climbed in the backseat,” Reposa said. “Meeting on MySpace ” if that alone is enough, then we can make the same claim for damages.”
Mr. Reposa makes a salient point. If a young girl is going to represent herself as 15 years old on myspace, her mother can not then seek monitary damages based on her child’s indiscretions. By broadcasting this to the nation the mother has made a mockery of her child and of herself. Mrspace is the catch phrase of the day, sooner or later, the litigation hungry public would find a way to sue. The repsonsible thing to do is control your children, monitor their myspace page, and know what is going on in their lives.