When I read the article, I had to rub my eyes a few times.

The moment the German Lawyers said "emotional suffering", I felt like I was going to throw up.

Is the German Justice system so messed up that he only serves 15 years of a "life" sentence?

This man is arguing that now that he has been released and walking the streets again, he wants his previous record of murder to just disappear?

This along with all the other crazy requests for censorship of Wikipedia will blow over and be forgotten soon.

The day information of 'facts' are censored on this scale is the day I start shooting!
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I would absolutely support his right to have any information about him removed from Wikipedia, or any other site, as long as said information is unsubstantiated. Information such as conviction for a murder is in the public domain, is not in dispute, and thus should not be required to be removed if true.

As a related aside, http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/chicago-bar-tender/2009/07/exhibit-a-will-one-chicago-womans-tweet-cost-her-50000.html shows another example of how wrong you can go, trying to sue over Internet information. In this case, a realty management company sued a tenant for defamation over a gripe she tweeted to ~20 followers.

The widely accepted opinion is that the company shot itself in its corporate foot (or possibly stuck its corporate foot in its mouth) PR-wise, as the lawsuit generated an enormous amount of Internet buzz, circulating the woman's gripe many orders of magnitude wider than the original tweet would ever have gone. Poetic justice IMO. It seems Wolfgang Werle is doing the same sort of damage to his name that his lawsuit allegedly is trying to prevent. Namely tying it even more tightly to the murder conviction than the Wikipedia article would have on its own.
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He lost his rights to personal information on his act the day that he was convicted. If rapists have to register as sex offenders, and everyone in the neighborhood be contacted, for years and years, then why are convicted murders any different?

I've said it a thousand times: The day a crime like this is committed, murderers don't only pay on sentencing day. They pay when they apply for a job, and here recently, even try to rent an apartment. He should have thought @ that beforehand.

Don't you think his victims family wants the world to know he is a murderer? The legal system posts this kind of information, and for very good reason. If this information wasn't available, he could be the next boy scout leader.

The only victim is the one he took life from!
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Personally, No. But they should have the right to try in court. The idea that these matters can be ruled on by a court of law is not altogether bad for a society. We may think (as I do, btw...) that it's an outrage. but it is this sort of thing, uncomfortable and sordid though it may be, that define the community standards we're supposed to abide by. Once the community standards get so far out of whack with what you are willing to tolerate, then it's time to take action: enact new laws, elect certain people to office, protest, educate others as to your point of view, or move to a community that is more suited to your beliefs.

In the end, these things have a way of working out.

Jose Pineda
http://josepineda.net
Source(s):
personal opinion

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This guy is a convicted murderer. The victim was mutilated and brutally murdered. It doesn't matter how many years he has served in jail. He is a murderer and a bad guy. The way we protect ourselves and those we love is by arming ourselves with information. We all (all over the world) have right to know if a convicted murderer is out in the world. The same goes for pedophiles and other people who commit violent crimes. I understand the German government wanting to protect its citizens by way of it's privacy laws but should these privacy laws protect one citizen at the expense of all the others. Don't get me wrong, privacy laws do protect innocent people but this guy is a violent criminal and could re-offend.

I know there are some who believe that he has been rehabilitated. That once a criminal has served his sentence in jail, he has served his debt to society, he has paid for his crime. However, there have been too many instances of people who commit violent crimes re-offending once they get out of jail. The public has a right to protect themselves against this and censoring information to protect criminals is just not right.

There is also this. Censoring the availability of information on convicted murderers in any case is like victimizing the families of the victims and anyone who cared about the victims all over again.

If these two re-offend and someone else is murdered because this guy wins his case in court it will be a serious miscarriage of justice. It will also be setting a precedence in court. If they start by censoring this, what next? Do we really want to protect those that might hurt us at the expense of everyone else.

If he succeeds in censoring information about him. He can put anything / any kind of information out there. Misinformation. Anything he likes and then go on to murder again. A lot of people get their information from the internet.

Does he have a good case and will he win in court? I am not a lawyer so I do not know. However, when it comes to foreign countries trying to censor US companies you can look at the case of LICRA v. Yahoo!.

The case was about Yahoo! allowing the sale of memorabilia from the Nazi period to their french citizens (which is against french law) through their online auction service. Yahoo's defense rested on the fact that it is a US company with their servers in the US and mainly aimed at US residents. Yahoo France was eventually ordered to warn french users that they may breach french law if they follow the links, Yahoo France was not ordered to remove the links.

Wikipedia has contributors of information from all over the world. It is however hosted by The Wikimedia Foundation which is headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States, and organized under the laws of the state of Florida.

This wikipedia case is a case of censorship of information not the sale of products although the Yahoo case did have an element of censorship in it.

All in all, the murder and the names of the murderers is a matter of public record and it should not be censored by anyone much less a convicted murderer.

He could win. Anything is possible but I certainly hope he does not.

http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/11/murderer-wikipedia-shhh

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LICRA_v._Yahoo!
This page does not always seem to come up. If it does not use the LICRA v Yahoo link in the above (first link) site.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2685565/Half-of-all-criminals-re-offend-withn-a-year.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1159477/Murders-rapes--shocking-crimes-65-killers-released-Labour-strike-again.html

http://cynography.blogspot.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:About

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation
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In your original question... you ask:

"Do you think Convicted Murderers should have the right to have information about them removed from the Internet? "

I can think of one instance where it should be... and that is when a conviction is later overturned.

I feel so bad when I hear about these men in Dallas who were wrongly convicted of offenses, which The Innocence Project is uncovering... most of which had DNA evidence to prove the men were wrongly accused and wrongly convicted... yet officials will not remove their names from sex offender lists even though they were INNOCENT. (some of these men were also convicted of murdering the victims.)

I was horrified that these men are having further injustices poured on them by the system... they are victims as well.

As for Wolfgang Werle, he's at the mercy of the courts and the courts of public opinion. His conviction has not been overturned and is a matter of public record.
Source(s):
personal opinion
http://www.innocenceproject.org/

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My answer is a big NO! I will take for example our murderer neighbor. He was convicted, imprisoned and came out of prison many times (since I was small) and now, he is already old but he still is not renewed. He is still harmful. If someone tells him to kill someone then he would do it willingly even that someone has not wronged him. That is why it is not good to remove criminals' names from the web. It's the only way we can be protected. What if you have hired a murderer? If you can't think for yourself, think for your children. Would you want them to associate with criminals, unknowingly?
Source(s):
own opinion

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Ok, this will be fun to watch. These people don't have one clue as to how the Internet works, there is no way to remove each and every mention of his name and its association to the murder. There will always be some server, somewhere (ie Mahalo) that will have the original article.

I don't think German law has any standing with regards to US based Wikipedia (I'm not a Lawyer, so don't come after me if I'm proved wrong), so try as they might, its not going to happen. The only thing that could actually happen is the German Government could block the website. If they do, good, who needs them.

What about the rights of the victim, oh wait, he's dead, guess German Law leaves him out.

Finally, Werle was convicted of murder, in the US, convicted felons give up their rights.
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This is a very interesting question.

I think we're entering brave new times in terms of personal freedom and the internet. A few days ago I actually raised the question of whether or not the internet is increasing or decreasing our freedoms ( http://www.mahalo.com/answers/society-and-culture/has-the-internet-increased-of-decreased-our-personal-freedoms-has-it-changed-the-way-you-behave ).

It's hard for me to comment on this case. Yes, he's a murderer and it's hard to sympathize with him. On the other hand, he's paid his time and is trying to make the best of what he has left of his life.

In this internet age I suspect to see lots of lawsuits demanding personal information being removed from certain sites. Information such as personal matters, health records, and libel.
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The answer to this question is simple.

Germans have decided the way they want to rehabilitate felons. And yes, under German law murders have rights concerning the publication of past offenses.

We should respect the opinions of the German public and German courts about how this matter should be treated. We should be law abiding citizens and not try and break German laws.
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No, I don't think they should have the right. There are public safety considerations. If the murderer is release or escapes, there should be information available for those who want to catch/avoid him/her. Also, information about the murderers' methods could be used to prevent future killings, and possibly solve old crimes committed by the same person.
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no of course not people should have a right to know.
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Hmm... well...

It depends on whether or not his jurisdiction has a policy of granting full pardons.

Not many countries do, but a few of them (Australia, Canada...) allow ex-cons to apply for a full pardon after they've paid their social debt and after they've proven themselves to be spotless citizens for a minimum number of years (generally seven, starting from when they finished their sentence).

In those cases, the slate is wiped completely clean from the police and public (aka media) records, but not from that of customs, so there can still be problems at the border, but one must physically be trying to cross for that to happen.

The first thing one needs to know is if Germany has a program for granting pardons, and if so, how extensive it is.

If it's as thorough as that of Australia or Canada, then they can force all server-admins in Germany to scrub the info, and then his lawyer can apply to have the IP address(es) of foreign servers blocked if they don't selectively filter the content as a function of what the requesting IP address is.

i.e., His lawyer could send the foreign server a letter saying that just that report must be filtered from being sent to the IP addresses that are specific to the German realm, else all content from that server might be blocked from entering Germany, and in most cases the server operators would probably just scrub the info or would implement a screening system for filtering content according to client-side IP.

It's not an easy issue, especially when the US is involved, because as a people American's have a thing about being willing to forgive but never forget, plus will tend to think that something like a political candidate having smoked a joint in college actually matters while an elected rep being a total piss-tank lush is okay, but the guy's lawyers will probably find that it will boil down to whether or not there's a treaty between Germany and the US to respect each others' system of justice.
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A convicted felon has no rights by his own choice. The idea that someone is able to censor a website that may or may not be factual is absurd.
This man served 15 years of a life sentence and was then paroled. This means his sentence has not been fully served. He has not fulfilled the requirements set forth by his own country and now wants to stifle this country's freedom of speech by censorship. When he serves his life sentence then he can be expunged of the crime. Until then, you do the time when you do the crime.
If criminals were able to remove their names from the public eye for heinous acts of murderous mutilation, how much easier will it be for less violent criminals to have their names removed from, oh I don't know, say, sexual predator lists? I have children and grandchildren that I am to protect from all dangerous people and activities. It is bad enough drunk drivers with suspended licenses are still able to drive and kill people but to knowingly allow a deviant such as this publicity seeking jerk to walk free from recognition would be a great injustice to all mankind.
The laws governing murder are harsh for a reason...so people think twice before committing such a violent act against another human being. Those wanting to legally commit murder should go to a state still instituting the death penalty and sign up for prison work on death row. If that last statement sounds ridiculous, think about a known killer wanting to remove his name from the public eye so he can get on with his life anonymously.
Choosing to end the life of another human being was a choice made by this man and his half brother some 15 years ago. Oh, now he has changed his mind and takes it all back. What about the people affected by his actions? What about the reason he committed the crime in the first place? And, what about if those same feelings overcome him again in the future? This was not a crime of accidental circumstance. This was a mutilation of another human being that is a violent crime deemed sick and perverted in many circles. The man wants no one to know he is guilty of this type of action or thought? If I were his neighbor, I would want to know his history. He wants me to be able to invite him over for a drink and not know any of his secrets.
There is a difference between a skeleton in the closet and a body in the ground. He can keep his homosexuality secret, if that is the case, but his cold blooded nature to take another man's life is not just something you throw out with the bath water.
Keep the entry in Wikipedia or remove all the entries about Jeffery Dahmer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Dahmer
or John Wayne Gacy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Wayne_Gacy
or even John Wilkes Booth and Lee Harvey Oswald
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Harvey_Oswald
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_wilkes_booth

History is history....it has already been written...what attorney or judge thinks it can be undone? This man is not saying he did not do the crime. He is saying he no longer wants to be known as the man who did the crime. So what? Now we plug in a name (john doe) to keep it a secret?
My opinion is he is not adjusting to society and when asked why he brings up sources like Wikipedia. Why has he not asked for a cease and desist from the media coverage of this request? He is gaining notoriety and celebrity status from all the publicity raised by this request from his attorneys. In other words, the family of the deceased should also request a cease and desist from this man profiting from the death of their relative.
Source(s):
My honest opinion

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