non-compliance with judicial requests for content removal
In August 2012, a judge from Florianópolis determined the temporary suspension of Facebook due to failure to comply with a court order requesting the removal of content in the midst of Elections period. The infringing content was a page that allegedly contained "derogatory material" to a councilor of Joinville. This was the first decision of this nature against Facebook, but the block was never executed.
BLOCKING ORDER
- Judicial Body
- 13th Electoral Region (Florianópolis)
- Judge
- Luiz Felipe Siegert Schuch
- Date of Decision
- August 9th 2016
- Type of Block
- Temporary (24h)
- Authors of the request
- Dalmo Deusdedit Meneses (Politician)
- Case Number
- 86-37.2012.6.24.0013
IMPLEMENTATION
OF THE BLOCK
- Agents
- N/A [block not implemented]
- Addressee
- N/A [block not implemented]
- Starting date
- N/A [block not implemented]
ORDER LIFTING
THE BLOCK
- Judicial Body
- 13th Electoral Region (Florianópolis)
- Judge
- Luiz Felipe Siegert Schuch
- Date of Decision
- August 11th 2012
- Case Number
- 86-37.2012.6.24.0013
CASE ANALYSIS
Facts
In 2012, City Councilor Dalmo Deusdedit Meneses filed a cautionary action against Facebook due to the page “Reage Praia Mole”, which allegedly posted depreciative material about the City Councilor during the electoral campaign, violating the electoral legislation.
Procedural History
On June 26th 2012, Judge Luiz Felipe Siegert Schuch of the 13rd Electoral District of Florianópolis granted the request for the cautionary action of City Counselor Dalmo Deusdedit Meneses, deciding exclusively for the removal of the content of the page “Reage Praia Mole”. In spite of that, Facebook did not comply with the judicial decision, causing the Judge to determine the block of the whole facebook.com domain for non compliance with court order on August 9th 2012. Nonetheless, the Judge himself suspended the execution of the sanctions applied to Facebook on reconsideration, demanding that it indicated legal representatives for contact and fulfilling of the judicial decisions.
Legal Grounds
Judge Luiz Felipe Siegert Schuch of the 13rd Electoral District of Florianópolis granted the request of cautionary action for the removal of the content of the page “Reage Praia Mole” under the argument that the electoral legislation seals anonymity (in article 21 of the 23.370/2011 Resolution of the Superior Electoral Court) and forbids propaganda that libels, slanders or abuses any person (in article 13, item IX of the 23.370/2011 Resolution of the Superior Electoral Court). These provisions were being violated.
Even after the decision, the page remained active. Therefore, due to the non compliance with this decision, Judge Luiz Felipe Siegert Schuch decided for the blocking of the facebook.com domain based on article 83 of the 23.370/2011 Resolution and on article 57, item I of the 9.504/1997 Law, according to which “upon request of a candidate, party or coalizion, observing the rite provisioned on article 96, the Electoral Justice can determine the suspension, for twenty-four hours, of the access to all informative content of the websites that cease to comply with the provisions of this Law”.
After this decision, Facebook expressed its disposition to collaborate with the Brazilian Electoral Justice on the construction of quicker mechanisms and procedures to give efficiency to the Brazilian electoral decisions. Before this, Judge Luiz Felipe Siegert Schuch determined the revoke of the sanctions applied to Facebook. However, he kept the decision of removing the content of the “Reage Praia Mole” page.