http://news.com.com/2100-1032_3-5211658.html Search engines take the stand Last modified: May 13, 2004, 4:00 AM PDT By Declan McCullagh Fifteen years after his trial, a convicted drug dealer in New York state belatedly got a chance to clear his name--thanks in part to an Internet search. A federal judge last November threw out Manuel Rodriguez's conviction and granted him a new trial after discovering evidence of potential jury tampering in a review of court records and queries on Web search engine Google. U.S. Magistrate Judge Frank Maas said that his review of the 1988 court transcript, coupled with looking up jurors' names in Google, had revealed that the assistant district attorney had "improperly" removed Hispanics. "A Google search that I conducted" suggested that a removed juror had "a Hispanic name," Maas wrote in the court decision overturning the conviction. Rodriguez finished his sentence before his new trial could take place. But his case nevertheless offers a striking illustration of the growing clout of Internet search engines among the judiciary--a controversial trend that's so far garnered little attention outside legal circles. In the United States and abroad, judges are turning to search engines such as Google to check facts, to look up information about companies embroiled in litigation, and to challenge statistics presented by attorneys in court. Dozens of judges have penned opinions describing Google as a valuable--and sometimes crucial--source of knowledge... In one case in Ohio, a judge who ordered a mother not to smoke near her 8-year-old daughter cited medical journals and a Google search that lists 60,000-plus links for "secondhand smoke" and 30,000-plus links for "secondhand smoke children." In addition, the California Supreme Court has Googled for evidence showing that stun belts, which jolt prisoners with 50,000-volt electric shocks, can be harmful and should not have been used in a criminal trial. And an enterprising federal judge in New York did his own Google search to demonstrate that a watch, jeans and handbag retailer named Alfredo Versace was infringing the trademarks of the famous Gianni Versace design house... After conducting a Web search, an Australian federal court last June denied a visa request from an unidentified man from Sri Lanka. The court said the man's claim to be a famous filmmaker worried about persecution at home was "exaggerated," after a query turned up a blank. "His name does not appear when put into a search engine such as Google," one member of the government tribunal wrote. "I would have expected--if he indeed has the notoriety and is as well-known as he claims--that his name would have appeared at least in some context." [...remainder snipped...] _______________________________________________ Politech mailing list Archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ Moderated by Declan McCullagh (http://www.mccullagh.org/)
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