18-year old Oregon resident Jacob Cox-Brown landed himself in jail on New Year’s Day, thanks to a Facebook post about his activities the previous night. That’s his status update above. If you can’t read it for some reason, here’s what it says: "Drivin drunk... classsic ;) but to whoever's vehicle i hit i am sorry. :P." Hey, at least he’s remorseful. Police found two damaged vehicles at 1am, and showed up at Cox-Brown’s house the next morning to arrest him for DUI after being tipped off about his post. Unfortunately the charge didn’t stick. From KGW in Portland:
Cox-Brown was charged with two counts of failing to perform the duties of a driver. Deputy Chief Brad Johnston said the teen was not charged with drunken driving because the Facebook post is not sufficient evidence that he was intoxicated.
I don’t want to defend this kid, since he's undoubtedly an idiot, but where is the evidence that he was "failing to perform the duties of the driver?" I hope they took paint samples from his car and didn’t make this charge based on Facebook alone. A status update isn't enough to charge someone with DUI, and it shouldn’t be sufficient evidence to charge them with anything else. Just because you post something on Facebook doesn't make it true. Kids lie all the time, and they'll post anything if they think it will make them seem cool. This kid says he was driving drunk, but in reality he probably took a shot of Nyquil and rolled through a stop sign. Are we really going to charge people based on no evidence other than a status update? If so, I'd like to turn in my friend John. He posted a picture of himself on Instagram wearing a backwards hat with his arm around a girl at a club, with the caption "Straight pimpin'." He obviously needs to be locked up for facilitating prostitution.
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