Providence, Rhode Island: Superior Court Judge Judith Savage has ruled that text messages cannot be used as evidence in the murder trial of Michael Patino because police had illegally obtained them. Patino is accused of beating his girlfriend's 6-year-old son, Marco Nieves, to death in 2009. Since the police did not obtain a search warrant before collecting evidence from Patino's phone, most of their evidence will not be able to be used in the trial. Judge Savage explained, "Text messaging, especially among young adults, has become an oft-employed substitute for face-to-face conversations, cell phone conversations, or email...Accordingly, this court finds that it is objectively reasonable for people to expect the contents of their electronic text messages to remain private."[1] The judge also criticized the police for the way they handled the evidence.[1]
