Man Sues Uncle Over Unflattering Facebook Picture
We’ve all hit the “untag” button on unflattering Facebook photos. Most of us have even asked a friend to delete a photo from an album that we feel does not capture our best angle. But none of us have sued over a Facebook picture–until now.
A Minnesota man recently sued his uncle after he was tagged in photos that he found inappropriate. Randall LaBrie posted “innocuous [but surely awkward] family photographs” of his nephew, Aaron Olson, as a boy doing trivial things like “posing in front of a Christmas tree.” Olson claimed that LaBrie malevolently uploaded the images and wrote “mean comments” under each photo.
Olson confronted his uncle, urging him to take the pictures off of Facebook. LaBrie agreed to untag the pictures, but replied that Olson should “stay off of Facebook,” if he had a problem with other people’s posts.
Angered, Olson sued his uncle for “harassment” and asked for a restraining order. The district court quickly threw out the case. He appealed the ruling, and the court of appeals tossed it out as well.
The court determined that comments ”coupled with innocuous family photos” do not effect “the safety, security, or privacy of another.”
While it is unlikely that LaBrie meant any harm in posting pictures of his over-sensitive nephew, this case is a broader win for virtual perverts everywhere.
