A court ruled that parents of two kids who created a fake account in the name of a colleague could be held responsible

Oct 16, 2014 15:43 GMT  ·  By

Parents in the United States may become responsible for the online activity of their children after the parents of two children who posted defamatory comments about another student in a fake Facebook account are heading to court.

Dustin Athearn and Melissa Snodgrass are both students in the seventh grade. In their free time, they created a fake Facebook page under the name of one of their colleagues, called Alexandria Boston, Alex in short. They then used an app that distorted her features, making her look fat, and made a bunch of offensive comments about the girl on the Facebook profile.

“After Dustin created the account, both Dustin and Melissa added information to the unauthorized profile, which indicated inter alia, racist viewpoints and a homosexual orientation. Dustin and Melissa also caused the persona to issue invitations to become ‘Friends’ to many of Alex’s classmates, teachers, and extended family members,” reads a document from the Georgia Court of Appeals, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The Facebook page was quickly turned into one full of graphically sexual content, racist remarks and offensive comments.

When Alex’s parents found the account, they went straight to the school principal to discuss the matter. Later on, Dustin and Melissa confessed to being behind the account and signed a statement in this regard. They were given a two-day suspension from school.

The account was active for another 11 months

The fake Facebook account, however, remained active for another 11 months until Facebook deactivated it. What’s more, during this time, the kids behind the account kept accepting friend requests, sending invites and – more – posted on the unauthorized page, even though the parents of the two children were notified in writing about what they had been doing.

The parents may now be found liable for not having their children remove the fake Facebook profile. “Given that the false and offensive statements remained on display, and continued to reach readers, for an additional 11 months, we conclude that a jury could find that the [parents'] negligence proximately caused some part of the injury [the girl] sustained from [the boy's] actions (and inactions),” wrote Judge Ellington in the opinion.

There’s been some big cases of online bullying in recent years, and the number only seems to keep increasing as time goes on. Last year, for instance, two girls in Florida bullied a girl on the Internet, pushing her to commit suicide. Such examples are, unfortunately, not singular.