• 🇳🇿 🇲🇲 🇯🇵 🇨🇳 🇦🇺 🇦🇶 🇮🇳
    Australian & Asian
    Drug Discussion


    Welcome Guest!
    Posting Rules Bluelight Rules
  • AADD Moderators: andyturbo

Disclaimers - do they work? (Victoria's legal system)

temporary_nick

Bluelighter
Joined
Apr 6, 2003
Messages
19
Hello and my apologies for posting with a temp nick. I was wondering whether anyone with a background or knowledge in criminal law can answer this question. Do disclaimers in electronic media like a webpage actually do anything useful? Will it prevent the police from getting a search warrant for something that was posted under a disclaimer on the grounds of "justifiable suspicion" regardless of the disclaimer denying possession of any illegal substances? I'll appreciate any replies! Thanks in advance!

P/S - This is in Victoria
 
I'm not a lawyer, but I'd suggest keeping everything you write on Bluelight as discreet as possible. Try to avoid advertising your intent to commit crimes, and your current or future possession of drugs. Talking about past drug experiences is not against the law.

If you want to discuss your material prior to posting publically, feel free to send me a draft by email or private message, and I can look over it for you. Personally, I would not place any faith in the legal weight of a disclaimer, as I'm fairly sure that a disclaimer made under false pretenses (ie., making a false disclaimer to cover your arse) would be void.

I can move this to Legal Discussion if you like?

BigTrancer :)
 
Thanks for the replies BigTrancer and johnboy. It's a personal website, and I've received legal advice that disclaimers doesn't work that way, as BigTrancer mentioned. You don't need to move the thread, I've already confirmed the issue with a legal helpline and the answer was disclaimers would not be effective in this situation. Anyway, if anyone else is wondering, it doesn't work this way, so discretion would be the key. :) Thanks again for the replies and the interesting bit of information that talking about past drug use would not be taken as a valid reason for a search warrant or anything of that nature.
 
No worries. I think it should be said, to anyone, that you should think very carefully about what information you put about yourself on the web, be it about drug use or anything else really.

Information you post to the web never goes away. Even if you deleted the pages in question they will be cached somewhere, be it at Google, or the internet archive, or by law enforcement agencies. Once it is out there it is out there, and you can't take it back.

We at Bluelight take all of this very seriously, and it is no accident that we have our server in Amsterdam. That said I also feel that we shoudl be free to talk about our drug use here, as it is barely a crime, and we can do so in the cloak of anonymity. But that level of anomnimity is up to you. We can only do so much.
 
Top