Text Messages Can Be Used Against Their Senders in Criminal Cases, Massachusetts Court Rules

Text Messages Can Be Used Against Their Senders in Criminal Cases, Massachusetts Court Rules
Young people text on their cellphones in a file photo. Dean Moriarty/Pixabay
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The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled on June 1 that senders of text messages aren’t granted a right to privacy that could stop law enforcement from obtaining and using their messages against them as evidence in a criminal case.

The 5–0 precedent-setting decision (pdf) came in a case involving a Massachusetts man, Jorge Delgado-Rivera, who was indicted—alongside six others—on cocaine-trafficking charges.
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