Every good thing comes with its downside. This is the case for social media in legal issues.
When aggrieved victims share their stories of woe on social media, other users will often cheer them to take the matters to court, where they would get justice and possibly a windfall from the case. However, with the unbridled use of social media, the same platform that encouraged them to take a legal route will turn back to hurt their case.
This is the situation with a plaintiff in the Largent vs. Reed injury lawsuit case, in which she claimed that a motorcycle accident left her with severe physical and mental pain. After the defendant established that there were pictures of the plaintiff going to the gym and enjoying life, the defendant requested that the plaintiff provide the defendant with her Facebook username and password. In another case, the plaintiff in Allied Concrete Co. vs. Lester filed a lawsuit against defendant in a wrongful death action. A Facebook post that included a photo of him holding a beer with a shirt declaring his “love for hot moms” caught the attention of his lawyer. Upon the advice of his lawyer, he cleaned up his Facebook page and deactivated his account. The trial court hit both the plaintiff and his attorney with sanctions for spoliation of $180,000 and $542,000, respectively.
What lessons can be learned in the above cases and several similar cases where social media became the undoing of litigants in court cases"
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