Dharun Ravi Case Study

Detailed Description of the Crime

The case, New Jersey v Dharun Ravi, involved a 20-year-old college freshman by the name Dharun Ravi as the defendant against the state of New Jersey acting as the complainant on behalf of a deceased student by the mane Tyler Clementi (Findlaw, 2017). Dharun Ravi was charged on 15 counts regarding sexual crimes, cyberbullying, hate crime, and invasion of privacy. By the end of the trial, the defendant was found guilty of hate crime, invasion of privacy and evidence tampering but was acquitted on the remaining charges (Hu, 2010). Ravi was sentenced to an aggregate three-year probationary term after serving 30 days at the at the correctional center. The defendant was also ordered to complete 300 hours of community

on the night of September 19, 2010, at around 9.00 P.M., the defendant came to her room after she accepted his request to come and visit (Findlaw, 2017). When the defendant arrived, he explained to M.W. that his roommate had asked for the room and he was not to return for a while. However, the defendant left briefly for his room before returning a few minutes later. When he returned, he used M.W.’s computer to video chat with his own computer that he left in the room (Europe Intelligence Wire, 2012). He explained to M.W. that he had set his computer to auto-accept any video call or video conversation. The defendant also explained to M.W. that he could possibly see what was happing in his room if he called his computer from someone else’s computer. He then proceeded to select his name on M.W.’s chat box, selected video chat and pressed the call button to connect to his computer (Findlaw, 2017). In a matter of seconds, the two received video feeds of what was taking place in the defendant’s room. Although the room was dark, M.W. told the court that they saw the video of the defendant’s roommate kissing another man. The video only lasted for a few seconds.

Apart from the video feeds, the court was able to retrieve several messages that the defendant sent to several friends inviting them to watch what was happening in his room. In one of the text messages, sent to C.C., P.K., and

Sufficient evidence presented in the courts revealed that Ravi was led by primary intentions to find out more about the private life of his roommate (Findlaw, 2017). Without breaking the law, he ought to have held a manly conversation with his roommate to find out if he was gay or not. However, the defendant chose to intentionally break the law despite the knowledge that spying on someone’s private life is not only unethical but breaches the fourth amendment of the United States constitution. This is a criminal offense that should meet a more retributive punishment to discourage other people from committing similar