The Toledo Blade reveals that Crystal Bowersox was a victim of unauthorized snooping by Toledo area police and others. Employees of 5 five police agencies and a municipal court “rummaged” through Crystal’s background without authorization.
There’s the downside of celebrity–strangers digging through your background looking for dirt. I wonder how many of the violators thought they could sell any information they found to tabloids like the National Inquirer?
In Columbus OH, an Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles clerk examined vehicles registered in her name. The home computer of an assistant city prosecutor was used to check on the Idol runner-up.
An Ohio Department of Public Safety official apologized in a July 1 letter to Crystal for the unauthorized breaches of her privacy, and that there was “no evidence she had become an identity-theft victim.”
“I had no idea it happened, ” Crystal told The Blade Wednesday night from her home in Los Angeles. “I’m disgusted by it.”
Crystal says police delivered a certified letter to her father, Bill Bowersox, at work, but he didn’t tell his daughter about the letter until after the American Idols Live tour ended August 31.
“You feel violated … but I guess it comes with the territory, ” Crystal said. “It’s completely disgusting that someone would do that to anyone. Not just a celebrity, but anyone. I’m not really sure what [their] motive was. But as far as I know, disciplinary action was taken.
“Part of this whole American Idol thing and being thrown into a spotlight, people are going to get curious. But I don’t think any of the people who participated in it would have wanted it to happen to them or their family members. That’s disgusting. What if somebody went and did that to their child or sister? It’s really saddening and disappointing.”
Crystal does not plan to file a lawsuit.
“I’m not a sue-happy person, ” she told The Blade. “What would I get out of these people? They already lost a week’s wage. I would not sue somebody for being curious, but it’s not OK for someone to snoop into somebody’s personal files.”
Crystal isn’t worried about any information they might have discovered.
“It would have said that I was poor, was on Medicaid, and I was on welfare with my child, and that my driving record was immaculate. My record has nothing on it. I’m not a criminal, I don’t do things like that, ”
“I’m just a normal human being. My pre-Idol life, I was raised poor and did everything I could to get by in life and that’s all they would find. I’m an honest person.”
The employees of the police department who misused the system to check on Crystal received punishments that ranged from a two-week suspension to written reprimands.
A municipal court employee accused of using the Ohio Courts Network to snoop on Crystal was forced to resign and could face a misdemeanor charge. And a clerk at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles was fired from his $43, 434-a-year job in June for checking Crystal’s vehicle registration information back in February. He was indicted last month for unauthorized use of property, a fifth-degree felony carrying up to a year in prison.
