Dismissal of MySpace Case 'Proper,' Defendant Says

A Missouri mother said she never should have been prosecuted for her role in a MySpace hoax directed at a 13-year-old girl who ended up committing suicide.A federal judge this week acquitted Lori Drew of misdemeanor counts of accessing computers without authorization, finding that the law she allegedly violated was unconstitutionally vague. U.S. District Judge George Wu stressed that the ruling is tentative until he issues it in writing.Friday, on NBC's "Today" show, Drew said she never should have been prosecuted."In my view, it was proper that this case was dismissed, primarily because I simply did not do what the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles accused me of doing," Drew said.Drew was found guilty in November, but the judge said that if she were convicted of illegally accessing computers, anyone who has ever violated the social networking site's terms of service would be guilty of that offense. "You could prosecute pretty much anyone who violated terms of service," he said.Prosecutors said at a news conference that they will decide to appeal after reviewing the written ruling. Drew's attorney, H. Dean Steward, said the ruling should mark the end of her criminal case.The parents of Megan Meier, the teenager who killed herself, were in court for the ruling. Later, her mother, Tina Meier, said that in spite of the disappointment, she thought that justice was done because "we got the word out."Much attention has been paid to Drew's case, primarily because it was the nation's first cyberbullying trial. The trial was held in Los Angeles because the servers of the social networking site are in the area.