This week on Weird and Wacky Wednesdays: Ask the Internet
Last week the column was about people who already knew the rules. This week is the opposite problem. Our subjects did not know the rules, so they looked them up. It seems people think their browser history disappears into the mist. But of course, browser history is the first thing police obtain.
Is this a crime?
Thomas Godden, 26, spent two years on Tinder and Bumble posing as a gay man looking for love. He was in a heterosexual relationship at the time. He took over £28,000 from three men, most of it from one man who was left in serious debt, and Canterbury Crown Court heard that two of his victims were on the autism spectrum. When they asked for their money back he made excuses, then threats, then he threatened to harm himself. It is a cruel offence and he got three years for it on March 17.
The interesting thing is the digital evidence that City of London Police recovered. Among it were the searches “Can you go to jail for romance scamming?” and “Can you go the police if someone owes you money?”
The first search is asking whether the thing he is doing has a name and a potential sentence for the crime. The second is asking whether the people he is doing it to have anywhere to go for recourse. So he was checking whether his plan was an offence and whether his victims could come back at him.
Am I on the website yet?
Andrew Hughes, 40, of Runcorn, and Owen Dunn, 24, of Bredbury, went on a two week run through Frodsham and Helsby in the summer of 2024. They started with a robbery, and it was not funny. They rammed a 15 year old boy off his e-bike with a car, throwing him to the ground with minor injuries, and they fled the scene while one of them rode away on his bike. After that they broke into a garage stealing two motorcycles and two e-bikes, and then a roof tent box from the top of somebody’s car.
On September 8 an occupant of an address in Helsby walked out and disturbed two men trying to take a tent box off a vehicle in the driveway. They ran for a grey Ford Puma, a patrol car spotted it on Chester Road, and Hughes was pulled out of the driver’s seat with various associated tools in the car.
Then police read his phone. Hughes had been searching “Frodsham police” and “Cheshire Police latest incidents today”, and visiting the news, appeals and wanted sections of the Cheshire Police website on multiple occasions, to find out whether the robbery had been reported. He had also been looking up bikes like the ones they had taken, to see what they were worth.
The best detail is the “tent box.” Police found these two had listed one for sale online before the theft was committed, then arranged to steal one to fill the order. Most thieves take a thing and then look for a buyer. This was intended as a “just-in-time” delivery.
Both pleaded guilty and received prison sentences of over 4 years.
Top crypto lawyers
Anton and James Peraire-Bueno searched for “top crypto lawyers” and “wire fraud statute of limitations” shortly after taking $25 million. The theft took about twelve seconds. The brothers got an early look at cryptocurrency trades that were supposed to be private and jumped in front of them. They are charged with wire fraud and related offences, and their first trial ended in a hung jury and a mistrial.
The prosecutors wanted a jury to see those two searches. A person who has just executed a completely lawful trade does not instantly hunt for a criminal lawyer, nor do they look up how long the authorities have to lay charges.
The defence argued that the searches should not form part of the prosecution’s case because they occurred while the brothers were already communicating with legal counsel. Hiring counsel is not evidence of guilt; it is a fundamental right, and handing those search queries to a jury invites them to treat the browser tab as an open confession. The trap, of course, is that proving an innocent explanation means revealing what was actually said to counsel, which is the very conversation protected by solicitor-client privilege.
Of every search in this week’s column, “top crypto lawyers” was the only sensible thing to type. It was also the only search anyone had to fight to keep out of a courtroom.
Obviously…
Incognito mode does not make anyone invisible, and search history does not vanish just because a tab is closed. Digital forensic investigators look at browser histories, cached searches, and timestamps almost immediately during an investigation.
If anyone finds themselves typing “how to commit a crime” or “will police arrest me for this” into a search bar, that is usually a pretty reliable sign to stop what they are doing. The internet might feel like an anonymous void, but when charges are laid, those search queries have a funny habit of ending up printed out on page one of the disclosure package.
If you find yourself typing the words “is it illegal to,” the answer is almost always yes, and you have now written it down.
