Before I get into this post, let me state that I believe the ruling in Italy is absurd.

What am I talking about?

Well a case, which has been in the hands of an Italian court for over 3 years, has just come to a conclusion–and 3 Google executives have just been sentenced to 6 months of jail time for invasion of privacy.

According to Reuters…

…a Milan court has convicted three Google Inc executives for the 2006 transmission of a video showing the bullying of a youth with Down’s syndrome, the judge in the case told Reuters on Wednesday…The case stems from an incident in 2006 when students at an Italian school filmed and then uploaded a clip to Google Video showing them bullying a schoolmate with Down’s syndrome.

The video was horrible, the person that captured and uploaded it surely is the person that most people would say should face jail time, but the law is the law, right? If you do business in a country, you should obey their laws and respect their judicial system, right? After all, this is Italy, not China!

Well, Google appears to be doing everything it can to get this ruling overturned.

We will appeal this astonishing decision because the Google employees on trial had nothing to do with the video in question. Throughout this long process, they have displayed admirable grace and fortitude. It is outrageous that they have been subjected to a trial at all.

I hear you Google. You should appeal it, but should you also publicly criticize a country’s legal system? A country you have been making money from for the past decade? What if that ruling had been in the UK or Canada? What if it had been handed down by one of our own courts? Would you still attempt to move this from a legal court to the court of public opinion?

I’m curious to hear what you Pilgrims think about this. Feel free to debate the ruling, but I’m curious if you think Google’s post portrays a company that feels it is above the law.

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