Sign In
Not register? Register Now!
Essay Available:
Pages:
5 pages/β‰ˆ1375 words
Sources:
5 Sources
Style:
APA
Subject:
Law
Type:
Essay
Language:
English (U.S.)
Document:
MS Word
Date:
Total cost:
$ 24.3
Topic:

Media and the Balance Between Public Safety and Privacy

Essay Instructions:

The birth, proliferation, and integration of social media into our society is now complete. Indeed, many of us rely on social media not only for updates from our friends, but also for news, events, entertainment, information, and social interactions.
Law enforcement is also using social media. In fact, social media has given law enforcement an incredible, nearly indigestible amount of open source information into the lives of the communities in which they serve. Law enforcement uses this information to analyze crime patterns, gang affiliations, and to solicit information from the community. Additionally, law enforcement uses social media to communicate with the public in times of crisis (i.e., emergency plan implementation). It is imperative for you as a criminal justice professional to be able to effectively use social media and understand how the police are using it to identify, locate, and apprehend suspects.
However, there is a popular saying that “technology moves faster than the law.” The legality of information obtained by law enforcement from social media is unclear. At what point does police use of information obtained on social media become a “search” or a “seizure” in the legal sense? Does it matter if the post is public (and obtained openly) or private (and obtained from the social network via subpoena)? How can we guarantee that the account owner made the posts that the police want to use as evidence? What, if any, rights do the accused have to protect them from unlawful searches and seizures on social media? Is the right to privacy violated when police obtain this information and/or seek to introduce it as evidence? Although there have been many law review articles and scholarly journals written arguing one way or the other, courts are still deciding the answers to these types of questions regarding law enforcement’s use of social media.
To Prepare:
For this Assignment, you will be using the Kaltura software to record a video. Review the instructions for recording with Kaltura that are posted in the Course Navigation bar.
Imagine that you have been hired as an expert witness by either the prosecution or defense in a Supreme Court case. In this role, you are to provide testimony on whether, in your expert opinion, the use of social media to collect evidence of criminal wrongdoing is fair and legally reasonable.
First, you will choose a specific recent case to focus on. Then, you will create a video of your testimony. It should be approximately 10 minutes in length.
The Assignment:
Choose a recent case on the use of social media to collect evidence of criminal wrongdoing. Then, choose a side to act as an expert witness for either the prosecution or defense. You will create a testimony on whether the way evidence collected of criminal wrongdoing is fair and legally reasonable.
Using the Kaltura software, create a video of your testimony. Your testimony should be approximately 10 minutes and include the following:
Begin by explaining the social media case you have chosen to act as an expert witness in, in a few sentences.
Explain which side you are representing on whether the use of social media to collect evidence of criminal wrongdoing is fair and legally reasonable.
State your opinion based on your analysis, and defend your analysis with references to scholarly resources, journal articles, or other legal sources.
Be sure to focus on the specific methods the police used to obtain the evidence via social media in the case you selected and how the evidence was used in the course of the investigation (e.g., to further it, to conclude it, to arrest, etc.).
Finish with a conclusion that contains a compelling statement or statements for the court to consider.

Essay Sample Content Preview:

Media and the Balance between Public Safety and Privacy
Student’s Name
Institution
Course Number and Name
Instructor’s Name
Date
Media and the Balance between Public Safety and Privacy
We live in unprecedented times where social media has taken over our daily lives. Social media has transcended the social sphere and penetrated the legal and criminal justice sphere. Prosecutors are now entering social media into evidence against criminals. It is becoming increasingly easy to collect evidence from social media because law enforcement does not necessarily need a warrant, mainly when the social media content in question is publicly available. Law enforcement can visit the suspect's social platforms to gather incriminating evidence. However, using social media as evidence of wrongdoing also has its challenges. One of the key challenges is that it is not self-authenticating, as Arshad et al. (2019) revealed. Law enforcement requires other corroborating information to authenticate social media evidence. Also, many unanswered questions remain about the legality and fairness of using social media in the justice system. In this presentation, I examine the use of social media as evidence of wrongdoing by paying particular attention to a recent case presented in the Supreme Court of California. I offer my expert opinion on whether using such evidence in the case is legal and fair.
The Case: The People v. Ware et al.
In September 2020, defendants/appellants Victor Ware, Dionte Simpson, and Nicholas Hoskins petitioned the California Supreme Court to review their case after a jury found them guilty of conspiracy to commit murder and criminal gang conspiracy (California Courts, 2020). The three appellants are part of San Diego’s criminal street gang known as 5/9 Brim or just Brim. They were charged with engaging in criminal activities, including conspiracy to commit murder, for the benefit of their gang. The appellants claimed insufficient evidence to support their conviction of conspiracy to commit murder and participation in a criminal street gang conspiracy. The appellants also argued that their First Amendment rights had been violated because the court admitted evidence of their social media posts to prove that they had participated in the conspiracy (California Courts, 2020). The appellants had been involved in a gang war with rival gangs and had attempted to kill several rival gang members.
Methods of Obtaining Evidence
Part of the evidence used to convict the defendants for conspiracy was obtained via social media. The police had collected a huge amount of social media evidence related to the Brim street gang, which was reviewed by a gang expert who is exceptionally knowledgeable about the gang's coded language and communication patterns (California Courts, 2020). It is unclear whether the social media evidence was obtained from private, shared, or public social media accounts, except for one instance. In that particular instance, it is revealed that part of the social media evidence was obtained from a public Facebook page of an alleged co-conspirator (California Courts, 2020). The rest of the evidence was obtained from other co-conspirators, although it is unclear whether their social media ac...
Updated on
Get the Whole Paper!
Not exactly what you need?
Do you need a custom essay? Order right now:
Order

πŸ‘€ Other Visitors are Viewing These APA Essay Samples: