I suppose it’s only fair that if your Facebook account can be a place to serve subpoenas, that the court can use your Twitter account to track you down and serve you with writs and other legal orders.  Consider the case of Donal Blaney, a blogger and attorney at Griffin Law, who found himself the victim of a celebrity impersonator on microblogging service Twitter.  Given that the Twitterer is anonymous, and thus difficult to hunt down, there was only one logical way to contact him:  reply to one of his Tweets and serve him the takedown notice online.  It’s not every day you get a legal precedent named after yourself!

Considering the case was over a fake Twitter account, is there any better way to serve notice than to tweet him?  I can’t think of a way, but I’m very surprised that High Court judges allowed it.  From a legal standpoint, it’s got to be a bit of a gray area to serve virtual paperwork, but these days everything is done via computer, so why NOT writs?  If it prevents another Serving Sara, then I’m all for it.

Image: scriptingnews on Flickr

Tags: Twitter, law, unusual court cases, Donal Blaney, Blaney’s Blarney order, fake Twitter accountsGriffin Law, Twitter used to serve an injunction, process serving, social media, microblogging, slander, libel, lawsuits

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