Sie sind auf Seite 1von 2

REVISED BILL STILL DAMAGES FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION PT.

1
According to a publication in the Searchlight Newspaper today 9 th August, 2016 with
amendments to the Cybercrimes Bill 2016, we see that there are still problems of antifreedom of expression clauses in the bill.
1. There is now an offence called libel by electronic communication. This is akin to the
criminal libel provision on our books (274) and is internationally recognized as damaging
to freedom of expression by international and regional organizations globally. It should
be decriminalized and not find its way in our Cybercrimes legislation. (Reporters Without
Borders, International Press Institute, Center for Law and Democracy, Association of
Caribbean Media Workers, Committee on Protection of Journalists, European Court of
Human Rights, OAS rapporteurs on Freedom of Expression, Article 19 Global campaign
for freedom of expression under the UN Human Rights Committee and International
Convention on Civil and Political Rights (to which SVG is a state party since 1981). Also,
the passage of online criminal libel in a harassment section of Grenada's Electronic
Crimes Act 2013 was repealed in the Electronic Crimes amendment Act 2014. It was
their section 6! http://www.iwnsvg.com/2016/08/04/decriminalise-libel-in-svg-now-it-isbackward/
2. Sexual harassment by electronic communication- This is an entirely new clause
recommended by the minister of Information to the select committee. It is a type of
violation of privacy clause. In fact if you look at clause 14 which deals with Violation of
Privacy you will see an inherent problem in its draft where, one must capture,
publish or transmit the image of a private area of the person without their
consent. It does not require that you publish the persons identification (like face etc.).
But this sexual harassment clause requires this personal identification information which
includes several things including the voice print of the person. Now, violation of
Privacy is a tort dealt with in civil law but is here now presented as a criminal offence.
While this clause will deal with revenge porn matters (although in a criminal sense), it
suffers from lack of a public interest defence clause which is necessary for appropriate
cases. Example: What if someone publishes the sexually explicit image of a politician or
a religious leader in a crime (rape etc.) with a minor. In so doing, he or she smartly
hides the identity of the minor/victim but exposes the identity of the perpetrator to help
in crime solving and to expose the corruption of the perpetrator. This clause would
criminalize this public interest exposure.
Furthermore, Vincentians must ask
themselves, what would they prefer? To go to civil court and get financial compensation
for the non-consensual exposures of their sexually explicit photos/videos or to have the
one who violated their privacy pay a fine to the state or go to jail or both? Regardless, it
needs a public interest defence clause as indicated above or such expression as it
relates to exposure of corruption will be damaged.

3. Cyberbullying is now a separate offence split into two: A. Cyberbullying of a person


other than a child or vulnerable and B. Cyberbullying of a child and a vulnerable. The
penalties for the cyberbullying of a child or vulnerable have been raised to 150,000 or 3
years in prison or both at summary conviction and 250,000 or 5 years or both at

conviction on indictment. This is higher than for the cyberbullying of an Adult who is not
a vulnerable. Of course this means that in a case of a child who is convicted of
cyberbullying another child, he or she, on the face of it, already faces a greater
maximum penalty than an Adult cyberbullying an Adult. This will criminalize children,
the youth and criminalize the truth. Furthermore, the same vague, subjective and
legally uncertain words are used to define cyberbullying such as causing a person "to
feel frightened", "humiliated", "distressed" and or causing "harm to the health or
reputation" of the person. Vague statutes violate due process because they fail to
provide fair notice of what conduct is prohibited; they set an "unascertainable
standard." Coates v. City of Cincinnati, 402 U.S. 611, 614 (1971) And A statute is
vague, and therefore facially invalid, if persons of "common intelligence must
necessarily guess at its meaning." (Quoting Connally v. Gen. Constr. Co., 269 U.S. 385,
391 (1926). In the absence of clarity, these vague terms open room for arbitrary
interpretation by law enforcement and prosecutorial and judicial officers.
To be continued

Anesia O. Baptiste

Das könnte Ihnen auch gefallen