Supreme Court Strengthens First Amendment Protections for Online Threats and Unwanted Messages

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled to make it tougher to convict someone of making a violent threat, stating that prosecutors must show that the defendant had a subjective understanding of the threatening nature of their statements. The case involved a man sentenced to over four years in prison for sending threatening Facebook messages, with his lawyers arguing that he suffers from mental illness and did not intend his messages to be threatening. The ruling, which was a victory for the defendant, sends the case back to lower courts for further review and may impact the prosecution of threats against public officials.