Megan Meier Foundation
Previously Aired On: Wednesday, March 19, 2008 - Listen to the Show!
13 year old Megan Meier participated in a number of activities, including swimming, boating, and fishing. She had been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and depression, and considered herself overweight. She was described by her parents, Tina and Ron Meier as a “bubbly, goofy” girl who enjoyed spending time with her friends and family.
Soon after opening an account on MySpace, Megan received a message from a boy calling himself “Josh Evans.” They became online friends, but never met in person or spoke. “Evans” claimed to be 16 years old, and Meier thought he was attractive. Meier began to exchange messages with Evans, and was described by family as having had her “spirits lifted”. He said that he had just moved to the nearby city of O’Fallon, was home schooled, and did not yet have a phone number.
Several weeks later however, Josh’s messages suddenly became cruel and in a note to Megan said: “I don’t know if I want to be friends with you anymore because I’ve heard that you are not very nice to your friends.” This and other cruel comments were posted on the internet relating to Megan and she became highly upset. Shortly afterwards, Megan Meier hanged herself in her closet and died the next day.
Six weeks after her death, Megan Meier’s parents were informed that the mother of one of their daughter’s friends - with whom Meier had a falling out - had created the “Josh Evans” account. The parent, Lori Drew, who created the fake account, admitted that she and her daughter had the password to the account, and characterized the hoax to a reporter as a “joke.” Initially, Drew denied knowing about the offensive messages that were sent to Meier. She told the police that the account was aimed at “gaining Megan’s confidence and finding out what Megan felt about her daughter and other people”.
The Meiers do not plan to file a civil lawsuit. Here’s what they want: They want the law changed, state or federal, so that what happened to Megan - at the hands of an adult - is a crime.
Since Megan’s death, there has been some changes made locally by the Board of Aldermen for the City of Dardenne Prairie, which passed an ordinance on 22 November 2007, in response to the incident. The ordinance prohibits any harassment that utilizes an electronic medium, including the Internet, text messaging services, pagers, and similar devices. The city of Florissant, Missouri also passed a “Cyber Harassment” law, with other municipalities, counties, and states considering following suit. The state of Missouri is to revise its harassment laws in response to the case, updating them to cover harassment through computers and mobile phone messaging, and creating a new crime to cover adults 21 and over harassing children under the age of eighteen.
The Megan Meier Foundation was created in loving memory of Megan, to promote awareness and positive change in response to the ongoing bullying of children.
Please visit:
http://www.MeganMeierFoundation.org
March 1st, 2008
--Previous Guests--, Tina Meier |
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