SCOW to address whether a complete ban on using social media as a condition of extended supervision violates the First Amendment.
State v. Jonathan James Petersen, 2024AP581-CR, petition for review of a published court of appeals decision, granted 5/20/26; case activity
SCOW will address whether the First Amendment permits a circuit court to impose a complete ban on using social media as a condition of extended supervision.
Jonathan James Petersen’s PFR presents the following issue for review:
Whether — and to what extent — a circuit court can regulate a defendant’s First Amendment activity as a condition of extended supervision.
In a published decision, the COA held that the circuit court did not unduly infringe on the defendant’s First Amendment rights when it imposed a total ban on using social media as a condition of extended supervision where Petersen was convicted of stalking, false imprisonment, and making terrorist threats. Petersen requested review in light of SCOTUS’s 2017 decision in Packingham v. North Carolina that limits on a sex offender’s social media use must be “specific” and “narrowly tailored” because “[t]hese websites can provide perhaps the most powerful mechanisms available to a private citizen to make his or her voice heard.”