At a May hearing, Wu grilled Assistant U.S. Atty. Mark Krause at length about whether the government had prosecuted Drew under the appropriate laws when they asserted that violating MySpace's terms of service amounted to a crime.
On Thursday, he again expressed concern that if Drew's conviction stood, anyone who violated the site's terms of use could also be convicted of a crime.
"The implication was that anyone on the Internet would be a criminal if they filled out a website registration using a fake name or using the wrong age," said Matt Zimmerman, a lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
"And I think that was a path the judge was not terribly interested in going down."
Legal experts have been grappling with cyber-bullying for years.
Although the anonymity available on the Internet creates opportunities for abuse, attempts to restrict cyber-bullying raise thorny issues about free speech.
"Ultimately I think Congress has to deal with this issue," said former Assistant U.S. Atty. Laurie Levenson, now a professor at Loyola Law School.
"The challenge is to draft legislation that . . . isn't so broad that it chills people's 1st Amendment rights and is enforceable."
Drew's lawyer, H. Dean Steward, said outside court that his client was relieved by the tentative outcome but "like the rest of us, continues to be saddened by the death of a teenage girl."
Steward, who has called the prosecution a misguided effort to seek vengeance, said Thursday that charges should not have been filed in Los Angeles in a case that was rejected by prosecutors in Missouri.
"The cynic in me says that Tom O'Brien wanted to make a name for himself or to keep his job," Steward said.
O'Brien acknowledged that prosecuting Drew under the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act was a risk, but he said, "I am proud to be involved in a case that sought justice for a 13-year-old little girl."
O'Brien said prosecutors would consider their options, including a possible appeal, when they receive Wu's written judgment, which could be filed as soon as next week. Megan's parents, Ron and Tina Meier, were in court Thursday and briefly addressed the news conference.
Although they expressed disappointment at the judge's tentative reversal of Drew's conviction, they said the case had served a purpose by drawing attention to the danger of cyber-bullying.
Fighting back tears, Ron Meier said: "A jury of her peers did convict her, and that is a victory in itself."
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alexandra.zavis@latimes.com
