Cyber-Trespassing: Actionable e-mail.

• Author: Doherty, Brian
• Position: Citings - Disgruntled former Intel Corp. employee sends mass e-mail to former co-workers; censured by courts - Brief Article

SENDING UNWELCOME e-mail can now be considered trespassing, according to a December ruling by a California court.

The case grew out of a squabble between Kourosh Kenneth Hamidi and Intel Corp., which fired him after a workman's compensation dispute. Hamidi decided to air his grievances with fellow workers--all 35,000 of them. On six occasions, he sent a mass e-mail complaining about Intel to between 8,000 and 35,000 employees of the computer chip maker. He was asked to stop but didn't.

In 1999 a Superior Court judge enjoined Hamidi from sending any more e-mails to Intel staff, on the ground that doing so constituted a trespass (or, in legalese, a "trespass to chattel"--chattel meaning any movable property). In December a 3rd District Court of Appeals panel upheld the injunction.

One of the panel's three judges, Daniel M. Kolkey, flied a vigorous dissent. He pointed out that previous judicial decisions prohibiting the sending of e-mail applied only to widespread commercial spamming that actually "burdened the computer...