Shelby Dell PR Research & Strategies,Florida A&M University March 27, today_people/t/late-cyberbullying-case/

October 17,2006:Megan Meier Commits Suicide  Three weeks before her fourteenth birthday, O’Fallon, Mo. native, Megan Taylor Meier, committed suicide and was found hanging in her bedroom closet by parents Christina and Ronald Meier.  Despite efforts to revive her, Meghan was pronounced dead at the local hospital several hours later.  Desperate for answers about their daughters tragic death, the Meier's began investigation and searched for answers on Megan’s MySpace account.  Megan’s inbox held a tread of disturbing taunts from a so called “friend” named Josh Evans calling her names, accompanied by a list of bulletins all aimed at insulting her. One of the last messages claimed the world would be a place without her.

 Megan struggled with attention deficit disorder, low self esteem and depression and was under the close care of a psychiatrist.  After creating a MySpace account Megan begins communicating back and fourth with an attractive 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans and they become good friends.  Josh consistently tells Megan she is beautiful and how he hopes to one day be more than friends.  Several weeks later Josh decides he no longer wants to be Megan's friend claiming she was not a good person. Mentally unstable,she is pushed her to her breaking point and commits suicide. The Backstory: A Virtual Affair /enlarge

 Several weeks after Megan's death, her parents were informed that the mother of one of Meghan's old friends had created the "Josh Evans" account and he was not a real person.  Lori Drew, who created the fake account admitted that she and her daughter had the password to the account, and characterized the hoax as a "joke” although they were completely aware of Meghan's depression and low self esteem.  Drew created the account solely see what Meier had to say about her daughter and other people in the community. Drew's plan was always to deceive and take advantage of Meier. MySpace: A Place for Deception

Media Highlights  When Megan Meier's story was first reported in the St. Charles Journal, the Drew’s were kept anonymous and remained unnamed out of concern for their safety.  Meghan Meier's tragic story received national coverage on all of the major media outlets and she became the poster child for cyber bullying  The identity of the “MySpace murderer” Lori Drew, was quickly revealed by webloggers, ] followed by the media which eventually revealed both her name and photograph. ]  At a press conference on Monday, December 3, 2007, Jack Banas, the prosecuting attorney of St. Charles County, announced that Lori Drew's 18-year-old employee, Ashley Grills, wrote most of the MySpace messages to Meghan Meier and including the final message from Josh Evans  After reviewing the case, county prosecutors decided not to file any criminal charges in relation to the hoax. This occurred due the the fact that there were no charges that fit the crime. The public was furious that Drew received no penalties and voiced them on numerous media outlets

The Story Continues:Justice For Megan  The Megan Meier case has caused several jurisdictions to pass or to consider legislation prohibiting harassment over the Internet.  The Board of Aldermen for the City of Dardenne Prairie, passed an ordinance on November 22, 2007 prohibiting any harassment that uses an electronic medium, including the Internet. Violations of the ordinance are treated as misdemeanors, with fines of up to $500 and up to 90 days in prison.  The state of Missouri aimed to revise its harassment laws in response to the case updating them to cover harassment through computers and mobile phone messaging, and creating a new crime to cover adults 21 and over harassing children under the age of 18. The new legislation went into effect on August 28, The bill was a reaction to Missouri police's inability to comprehensively prosecute Lori Drew for cyber bullying and harassment via the internet.  H. R 6123 The Megan Meir Cyber bullying Prevention Act was introduced to Congress on May 22,2008 to amend title 18, United States Code, to include cyber bullying as s federal offense.  Christina Meier started the Megan Meier Foundation to promote awareness, education and promote positive change to children, parents and educators in response to the ongoing bullying and cyber bullying in society.

PR Lessons Learned What worked well? What didn’t work well?  In order to perform investigation the prosecution waited a year before bringing the case into the light of the media and general public. By then many had forgotten about it.  Online sources overrode professional news sources decisions not to release the names of the Drew family which resulted in a lot of confusion.  Media reported based on information provided in blogs and unverified websites leading to discrepancies in facts and information.  The Meier family was highly visible within the media and did several interviews sharing the compelling story of their daughters suicide.  The Meir family branded themselves as the vigilantes against cyber bullying and online harassment.  The Megan Meier Foundation created a cyber bullying hotline  The state of Missouri incited the first cyber bullying laws prompting the rest of the nation to do the same. te-social-media-your-website/

Lessons for MySpace What they did… What they didn’t do…  MySpace created a stop cyber bullying page to create awareness among users.  Released a guide for school administration about cyber bullying and signs to look for among students  Created a cyber bullying hotline especially for school system administration  Prompted for more underage users to create private profiles.  MySpace did not release a statement about Meier's suicide.  They did not enforce any new safety regulations on the website.  MySpace did not support the Megan Meier Foundation efforts. ntegrate-social-media-your-website /