Panel seeks cyber-stalking law

Sending harassing e-mails or text messages would be illegal in Spokane under a proposed city “cyber-stalking” law unveiled Monday.

The law also would make it illegal to make “harassing, intimidating or embarrassing” postings on Web sites such as MySpace.com, the City Council’s Public Safety Committee was told.

The three committee members – Joe Shogan, Bob Apple and Mary Verner – voted unanimously to forward the proposed addition to the city’s Municipal Code to the full City Council for a first reading later this month.

It could become law by this summer.

“It is becoming more of a problem,” Assistant City Prosecutor Paul E. Masiello, who is assigned to the City-County Domestic Violence Team, said in describing cyber-stalking crimes to the Public Safety Committee.

The city law would make it illegal to send any form of electronic communication “with intent to harass, intimidate, torment or embarrass any other person.”

Violation of the law would be a gross misdemeanor, punishable by a maximum of one year in jail and a $5,000 fine.

But if the perpetrator threatened to kill the recipient or anyone else,or if the sender previously was convicted of harassment with the same victim, the cyber-stalking charge would become a felony.

The new law will join existing city ordinances dealing with telephone harassment and harassment.

It’s patterned after an existing state law.

Masiello and City Prosecutor Howard Delaney told the committee the new city law was needed after they had to use the state cyber-stalking law in a recent case.

City prosecutors who charge people with violating city laws can’t file state charges unless they are cross-designated as county deputy prosecuting attorneys – a designation Masiello has as part of his work on the Domestic Violence Team.

In one recent case, Masiello said, a 51-year-old Spokane man and his wife separated, then divorced, and the husband developed a new relationship with another woman.

When his ex-wife found out about that relationship, she sent her ex-husband 35 to 40 “profanity-laced text messages,” Masiello said. The man called Spokane police.

“She was not threatening any harm,” Masiello said. “He was not afraid of her, so the conduct didn’t fall into the stalking or harassment laws.”

After an investigation by a Spokane police officer, a complaint alleging a violation of the state law was filed against the woman who had sent the messages to her ex-husband. The case against the woman is pending in District Court.