There are different levels of harrassment. Some is well deserved and feeds off of a response both from the harasee and those gawking at the drama unfolding.
It can be fun, even a sport, if done correctly.
The line between fun and damaging gets blurred quickly.
At any rate it takes two to play a game. Sounds easy right? Not so. All it takes is for one side to keep going and going. Sooner or later there will be a response. No one can ignore it forever.

This example in this story doesn't sound like he did anything to be sued or convicted over barring damaging content of the emails. If he threatened her or made false accusations, then I would call that crossing the line.

This is like getting mad because Megatron beat up Optimus Prime. It's not real people. Let it go.

Serously who hasn't seen this before? Some hyper-agressive chick taunts a overgrown 10-year old. He flips out (big suprise!)next thing you know he burst out with a super-duper stream of pent-up rage. Suddenly she is afraid and needs to call the cops because she is being harrassed. Here is a better idea MAN-UP, there are no boogie-men. Just people siting in comfy chairs eating ho-hos and talking out of there behinds.

You know I had a crazy cow do similar things like this to me several years ago. She emailed me she posted nasty things about me and it went on for months driving me INSANE I finally blocked her on all my accounts and closed some accounts and sent her a cease and desist letter and had a lawyer friend call her

once she got that lawyer call
I never heard from the crazy cow again

It never ceases to amaze me how many crazy power hungry people who have Nothing going on in their lives and have No real control in their life get on a computer and Now they want to be the "alpha" person. It is shocking how many adults flash back into kiddy commandos.

Add in the kids who all get no attention at home who come online and try to pretend they are grown but every one sees through it and they act like Jacka**es to get the attention that they should be getting at home
They are the ones who grow into these adult idiots

Frankly this could all be solved if she ignored him and he ignored her when i visited her blog all you see are posts about Him and this situation' Why not just Move the heck on ignore him and be the grown up in this

The word, Sugarglider, is overkill. The 27 emails and the mass infestation of parasites visual.

and would wish a plague of itchy scabies infections to both of their genitals and in the folds of the skin at the groin, elbow, knee, armpit and any other place there are folds

Aaaah! So graphic. I feel itchy just reading it!

this whole ... story is bullshit in my not so humble opinion.. clogging up our judicial system with bullshit just makes me hope the fuck the judge laughs the entire thing out of court, then cites them both with a hefty fine for wasting the courts time.

i have zero sympathy for either of these fuckwads and would wish a plague of itchy scabies infections to both of their genitals and in the folds of the skin at the groin, elbow, knee, armpit and any other place there are folds. i'd also wish a healthy dose of crabs to boot. keep these two too busy scratching their skin off to give a fuck one about what the other is doing.

~ceisdsgil

I'm not saying Mary isn't a tool, mind you.

And here are some gems from her blog. From the ABOUT me section:
"Dr. Mary Johnson, PEDIATRICIAN, Board-certified. ASHEBORO, NORTH CAROLINA. Third-person nutshell: Against odds, local girl makes good . . . becomes MD . . . despite bad experience as a child, comes home to work for Randolph Hospital."

Okaaay.

From the dopey picture, the retarded site, this guy is a loser anyway,what more could you expect. anyone who has time to send that many emails would make anyone nervous. This nitwit needs to grow up and get a life

Yeah--I'm not quite clear on if the emails were sent after, before, or during, but, either way, same diff pretty much!

I like my intertube as much as the next person, but homegirl and homeboy here need some additional hobbies. Or, hmm, maybe they should just book a room at the local No Tell Motel and sex it out. If I were the judge, perhaps I would suggest this :)

Banning someone from your site and then sending them 27 emails (with statements like “I know where you live” in them, no less) is like getting a restraining order against them and then showing up at their house.

Indeed, a particularly apropos comparison. :P

Morbid: Right, but he's full of it for saying this: “(She’s()) been at my place for 3 years I didn’t want her to be there anymore. It’s that simple.”

If it were THAT simple, it wouldn't take 27 emails in an hour to say so and be clear about it. 27 emails are an invitation for further contact, because they themselves constitute quite a lot of contact. If you don't want someone contacting you there are "simpler" ways to make that happen. What he did makes it more rather than less likely that contact would continue. It seems especially odd since your article suggests he had indeed banned her from the site.

Banning someone from your site and then sending them 27 emails (with statements like "I know where you live" in them, no less) is like getting a restraining order against them and then showing up at their house.

Athena: Sure, but, as always, whatever one's opinion about a law may be, law is law. Me, I think both these people are ridiculous, full of it, passive aggressive, cry-wolfers, and so forth, who have been enabled byt he intertubes to live their lives out via blog. It all seems absurd to me, the whole thing. She sounds like a possible stalker, still trying to get attention from him. And he seems happy to give it to her.

How is he full of it, sugarglider? He admitted to sending the emails. I just do not like seeing the day when a stupid Internet argument lands someone in court clogging up the process because someone got 27 emails in an hour. Had he did this every hour for an entire week, then sure. But one time and now he's in court?

Oh, sure. Harassment legislation is often written in a vague, overcompensating manner. Because it's essentially a law created to protect people's feelings. Luckily, most people don't take advantage of such a law's more trivial applications.

The definition of harassment, from the penal code:

The Modern Penal Code section 250.4(MPC) defines harassment as a petty misdemeanor if with purpose is to harass another, he: 1) makes a phone call without a legitimate purpose; or 2) insults, taunts or challenges another in a manner likely to provoke violent or disorderly response; or 3) calls at inconvenient hours or in offensive language; or 4) subjects another to offensive touching; or 5) engages in any other course of alarming conduct serving no legitimate purpose of the actor.

Whatever: if you don't want contact with someone, you don't email them 27 times in an hour. That's an email every 2 minutes on average. And these were lengthy emails, no less. If he didn't want her posting on his blog, he should have blocked her. Dude is full of it.

Being someone well versed in internet drama and general rules of argument on the internet, I say if you can't take it, don't get involved. Woooo, he got a bunch of emails. It's called a blacklist for a reason; just block the sender. Amazing.

If you get into an argument on the internet, expect the other side to play dirty; it's how it goes, and when both parties remember this, it's fun. When they don't, it's still fun for the side that remembers. You DO know better than pull the 'I know where you live' crap though, and her including that is the only reason I might consider charges to have any weight, but eh. Sounds like someone's a bit over sensitive.

But has anyone actually SEEN the emails yet? I see that he's offering the password to them to anyone who pays the $25 "donation." *rolleyes* I'm just wondering just what was in them, and THEN I can really figure out if I think this is a case of 2 equally immature drama queens, or if perhaps one or the other really has a right to feel offended. If his emails are innocent beyond the whole creepy "I know where you live," then I say she should get charged with whatever charge it is when you take time away from the cops' real investigations. If they're worse, then maybe she's totally right to have turned him in.

And regardless, both have so far sunk too low in my respect for much else. He's asking for donations for this stupid cause, and she I assume was at least harrassing his blog. What's the old saying, "a horse a piece" or something?

But the content of those emails would sway me one way or the other. I can see both Athena's point and mammasweets--if it was minor as he's claiming, that's just a nuissance and if she wasn't going to ignore him, then she should have posted them all for the world to see how annoying he was. If they're more than that, I do think she had a right/reason to be worried and to turn him in.

I've been involved in online drama before and it gets out of hand surprisingly quickly and suddenly you realize what a fool you were, and if you're intelligent/mature, you laugh it off, apologize if required, and go on about your business. Nothing else is really said/done except a few snarky comments here and there, but it dies, like adult insignificant conflict SHOULD die. But sometimes, there are some real crazies behind the threats and the personal data snooping. That's somewhat scary.

Now, if she, or you, or whoever, is able to establish an ongoing pattern of harassment, that’s different.

That's my thinking as well. This was a one-time barrage of emails between two people holding a grudge. It's hardly what I would label cyberstalking - even if it does fit the NC legal description.

I have to disagree with you, Athena. Email is a way to reach her sort of like a telephone. If this were him calling her that many times in a hour you would feel different some how?

While the telephone is actually a bit more invasive, no, I still wouldn't feel differently if it were the phone.

I don't care if he e-mailed or called 100 times in that period of time. Harassment is traditionally defined as ongoing. One hour is not "ongoing", in my opinion. Now, if she, or you, or whoever, is able to establish an ongoing pattern of harassment, that's different. If she blocked his e-mail and he created another account just to get at her, and these e-mails flooded in over the course of days, that would be more worthy. But if excessive contact in a one-hour period of time is all she went to police over, it's clear to me she's taking advantage of the justice system to stick it to him over some petty beef, and I think they should both grow the fuck up.

What are my thoughts? My thoughts are simply this: he looks like my ex-boyfriend, and unfortunately for him, that means that I'm more likely to take the good Dr.'s side. Not fair, I know, but my stomach clenches up just looking at his stupid photo.

Ya know, I didn't even think about it that way. I would like to see the full emails, but from what HE is claiming, it does not sound like anything to be too scared over yet. Again though, we're only seeing part of the story and for all we know, there could have been a lot more in those emails. Has he been willing to show THOSE to everyone? He's offered her posts to the reporters, but just kind of gave a summary of the emails that HE sent.

...3 minutes after starting this reply: OMG. Just got back from his blog and that boy is sickening. Forming a "justice league" and asking for $25/person from supporters? Good God, I hope those people all lose any additional money they have very soon, because I'd hate to see what other stupid shit they would support.

Count me in as an official wisher that the both of them would simply lose all rights to internet access and be forced to attend kindergarten to learn to deal with reality.

I have to disagree with you, Athena. Email is a way to reach her sort of like a telephone. If this were him calling her that many times in a hour you would feel different some how? I had to get an injunction against someone for that very reason. There are clear boundaries and he breached them with his wonky "OMG She made me so MAD!" moment.

Do they have a history of stupidity back and forth? Sure as shit. That part they should both have learned to let go and grow up a bit but he went a too far with it.

but at this point, it sounds like two individuals who can’t manage to behave in an adult manner.

EXACTLY. Shit like this always reminds me of the "Ooooooh, I'm teeeeellling!" shit from grade school. I don't agree with Martin spamming her email, but I cannot believe Johnson was petty enough to contact police over it.

I think cyber-harassment is kind of bullshit. I mean, sure, he spammed her e-mail account. She can easily delete those without looking and then block communications from him.

I could understand better if this was lasting over the course of weeks or months, his cyber harassment of her, but at this point, it sounds like two individuals who can't manage to behave in an adult manner.

The e-mails included messages such as, “Everyone knows your crazy, but no one has exhibited the courage to deal with it. I’m not afraid of you.” Martin also admitted to sending Johnson an e-mail telling her he knows where she lives. Martin said there was no threat intended, but he simply wanted to stop Johnson from attacking him and his friends in the blogging community.

Martin and Johnson are not strangers. Martin showed WXII what he said are 400 comments that Johnson has made on his blog over the past few years, forcing him to ban her from his site.

This is a hard one to comfortably decide on a definite opinion. On one hand, his emails were totally out of line in subject, beyond the basic of having so many sent in a short time. Anyone who has spent more than 2 seconds on any kind of active community, which his blog sounds like it may be, would know better than to bring up the personal "I know where you live/who you are/blahblahblah" angle. I'd like to see her comments, and may work up the energy to go over to his blog later to see if he has left them up. Dams sound like such a boring subject, that it's hard to care enough... lol