Google Street View Snap Gets Taiwan Man Convicted

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- A Taiwanese judge has used a Google map showing an unleashed dog to hold a man responsible for his neighbor's bicycle accident.

A defendant surnamed Lee denied being the dog's owner and causing injury through negligence.

The victim surnamed Peng testified that he became scared after the dog began pursuing him while he was riding his bicycle last July. He said he fell off the bike and injured his forehead.

Judge Song Kuo-chen said Thursday that a two-year-old Google Street View picture showed the dog standing in Lee's yard which meant that Lee was its owner. Police had earlier said there were no other dogs in the rural neighborhood in Miaoli County south of Taipei where Lee and the victim live.

The judge fined Lee 59,000 Taiwan dollars ($2,000).

Comments

[Princess Rita]

02:08 PM on 07/08/2012

In a way that is like spying on people, in this case it was good...........

[mairs]

01:12 PM on 07/06/2012

I looked at Google's street view of my property and I could see the horses that the previous property owner had, and this one area full of weeds used to be a riding ring with jumps in it. Interesting.

[loki]

03:54 PM on 07/06/2012

yeah, they dont update that often. I looked at my place a while back, and it still had a car in the driveway I sold 3 years ago.

[thealmightyshua]

03:35 AM on 07/06/2012

So, the dog was standing in the guys yard two years ago when a picture was taken. Was the dog inside a fenced area of the yard? Or is this a dog that was just wandering around and happened to be in his yard when the picture was taken? If people can be prosecuted or ticketed because a picture showed an animal in my yard, I'd be in a lot of trouble. That squirrel that the neighbor caught on camera in my yard yesterday stole acorns out of another neighbor's tree, so I'm responsible for theft I guess. The rabbit that was there when we took a picture in our yard of our family reunion stole some food from the neighbors garden too. LOCK ME UP!!! lol

[CoronaDischarge]

12:28 PM on 07/06/2012

In the US beyond reasonable doubt isn't the issue. This was a civil tort. And apparently the preponderance of the evidence ... the dog being in the same vicinity, and in the man's yard for two years ... was enough. While I don't find just this one Google fact overly persuasive, with corroboration of any other evidence, not addressed in the article, it would seem to be likely sufficient.

[ishgirl]

03:31 AM on 07/06/2012

There are eyes everywhere...

[MichaelMcKLA]

09:07 PM on 07/05/2012

Interestingly, a very large part of Africa hasn't yet seen a Google camera car.

[ebanks84]

07:46 PM on 07/05/2012

Good catch.

[General Hermes]

05:50 PM on 07/05/2012

There should be cameras everywhere, especially in big cities.

[J0E1]

06:55 PM on 07/05/2012

No, there shouldn't.

[General Hermes]

07:08 PM on 07/05/2012

Crime prevention is more important than paranoid "big brother" baloney.

[General Hermes]

07:07 PM on 07/05/2012

Yes there should be

[Sakidog]

08:00 PM on 07/05/2012

No , there should not be . what there should be are harder laws.. you steal other than food CUT THE HAND OFF they only do it twice and no long rap sheet .. insurance rates go down ..... you kill someone and there is no way the police are wrong ? kill them on live tv ... no cable tv in the jail cell ,,, no weight room , just gone ... and i bet the murder rate would drop ... i could go on in on but you get what im saying ....

[John96]

05:15 PM on 07/05/2012

Now just suppose the dog realoly belongs to a neighbor? When was the last time anyone ever heard ofa dog or cat defecating or urinating in their own yard. I do not own a dog or cat but I am constantly having to pick the droppings they leave behind. I don't buy the use of a google photo as evidence in this type of cae and as far as the dog standing in this yard it proves nothing about ownership. Another Judge making law instead of interpreting. Maybe the dog really belongs to the Judge or the victim is a relative of the Judge.

[thealmightyshua]

03:57 AM on 07/06/2012

Actually, my dog ONLY urinates and defecates in our own yard. She's 2 years old and has only once gone to the bathroom elsewhere. Before you come back and say that I must never take her out for walks or anything, we are always going out for walks of about 2 miles at a time. She has opportunity and just doesn't do it.

[rleduffe]

05:01 PM on 07/05/2012

Convicted... Is that what the man was? Sounds like he was simply fined. What a sensationalized non-news story.

I suppose we are to believe that a Google Earth camera is somehow to be considered less of a witness to a "crime" than a physical person witnessing the "crime" with his own eyes.

[chris784100]

03:37 PM on 07/05/2012

I love when liars get busted. The only problem is this dog will probably be put down. Taiwan has about as bad of pet owners as there is. The population is only 23 to 25 million and they manage to euthanize 80,000 dogs per year. Their religion Buddhism believes that dogs are reincarnated people that were bad in their former lives so dogs are disposable to say the least.

[pin10]

04:12 AM on 07/06/2012

Stupid religion.

[RIGHTtheWrong2121]

03:05 PM on 07/05/2012

This is a 'dog-gone' shame:) LOL

[Wise-guy]

02:41 PM on 07/05/2012

I find this a little funny

[HRLS]

02:31 PM on 07/05/2012

The dog standing in the man's yard does not mean he's the owner of the dog.

[wrasmus306]

02:20 PM on 07/05/2012

Hey, Google has a picture of the car I bought my daughter in front of my house. She traded it in, but what if someone connects me to it with that picture after she sold it? Innocent as a new born babe I am, but, for sure, the judge would be looking at me and saying "Wes, you got a lotta 'splainin' to do!!"

[chris784100]

03:40 PM on 07/05/2012

What is your point? As long as you have a bill of sale and took the plates off the car when you sold it there should be no problem. Most people leave the plates on the cars they sell so the new owner does not have to register the car until they registration expires so any tickets given from red light camers or even bills from toll roads will go to the origional owner.

[wrasmus306]

05:20 PM on 07/05/2012

Actually, had police come to my house sex months after doing jsut that. Traded car in, and it was used in a robbery. Police came looking at MY house. So, that is the point. Your logic is good, but not always true in the real world.

[alabamajack]

01:16 PM on 07/05/2012

That is not me sneaking out of the married woman's house next door in that Google picture.

[Kommonman]

11:31 AM on 07/07/2012

married man's then LOL i know to much but funny