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Family Fights Ghastly Crash Pics on Web

AOL
posted: 190 DAYS 6 HOURS AGO
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(April 30) -- When Nikki Catsouras died in a car crash, her parents were left to cope with the loss of their 18-year-old daughter. But the tragedy became even harder to bear when they received a gruesome photo of the teen's body.
Now, 2 ½ years after the fatal accident, Christos and Lesli Catsouras are still confronted by horrifying images of Nikki's death that are circulating on the Internet, Newsweek magazine reports.
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Nikki was killed in a car crash on Halloween day in 2006, after taking her father's Porsche 911 Carrera without permission. According to police reports, Nikki was traveling 100 mph on State Route 241, near Lake Forest, Calif., when she struck another car and lost control, ultimately slamming into a concrete tollbooth. She died instantly.
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As is routine in fatal accidents, the California Highway Patrol took photos of the crash, including gruesome images showing Nikki's nearly decapitated head covered in blood. Authorities never showed these photos to Nikki's family. The coroner said it would be too upsetting for Christos and Lesli Catsouras to see their daughter's body, even to identify it.
But two CHP officers leaked the photos, and the images quickly began circulating over the Internet, turning up on everything from pornography sites to social networking services, Newsweek said.
Even Nikki's grieving father couldn't avoid the pictures. Days after the crash, the real estate developer opened an e-mail he believed was a property listing and found instead a grisly photo of his daughter's body.
Nikki's three sisters have never seen the photos, but the family lives "in fear of the pictures," Christos Catsouras told Newsweek. "And our kids will never Google their name without the risk of seeing them."
The Catsouras family has launched a series of legal fights to try to get the images off the Internet and to promote greater privacy protection on the Web.
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With the help of attorney Keith Bremer and a tech company called Reputation Defender, the family first pursued individual Web sites that displayed the photos, issuing them cease and desist orders. Those efforts ultimately proved futile.
They then sued the CHP for negligence, privacy invasion and infliction of emotional harm, in hopes of setting a precedent to discourage leaks in the future. In March 2008, a Superior Court judge called the officers' conduct "utterly reprehensible" but dismissed the lawsuit, saying they hadn't broken the law. The Catsouras family has appealed the ruling.
The family acknowledged to Newsweek that telling their story might have the unfortunate result of prompting some to seek out the crash photos. But they decided to come forward in hopes of saving other families from the pain they've endured.
"The fact is that we will never get rid of the photos anyway," Lesli Catsouras, Nikki's mother, told Newsweek. "So we have made a decision to make something good come out of this horrible bad."
Get the full story from Newsweek magazine.
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Seattle Police Department / AP
Seattle Police Department / AP
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2009-04-30 18:22:36

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grotesquexbetty

06:04 PMMay 07 2009

I agree with tenis. Obviously.Esquivel, you're just stupid and hypocritical. Also, cmom, I agree with you 10,000% and I think I know you on Cafemom..

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Tenisfene

05:58 PMMay 07 2009

ROLANDESQUIVEL, I've played competitive tennis since I was about 8 years old. I guess you'd consider me an athlete, I have NO problem spelling thank you.Athlete is NOT necessarily wrong, in fact, he's MUCH closer to the mark than you. I especially like how you called him and him family shit, after he called her those things like it supposedly makes you any better.You're an idiot. May God have mercy on your very confused soul.

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CMDRMOM2

05:50 PMMay 07 2009

If the photos save even one life, then they have served a purpose.

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(2)

Thomcit

05:25 PMMay 07 2009

AMERICA has become a nation of VOYEURS & RUBBERNECKERS !! It seems that we can't get enough of those stupid REALITY SHOWS. We are a nation of RUBBERNECKS. How many times have you had to inch along the highway, only to find out that the wreck was on the other side of the highway...all b/c folks felt the need to see a little CARNAGE. Most NASCAR FANS attend a race hoping to see a big CRASH. The CAGE-FIGHTING spectacles on T.V. have become an obsession. Now, all we have to do is go to some website if we want to see GORE. Lastly, getting the "NEWS" of the day isn't good enough anymore. Many Americans want to see CONFRONTATION (i.e. FAUX NEWS).

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ROLANDESQUIVEL

02:04 PMMay 07 2009

AthleteincontrolYou are the stupid SHIT,and like so many"athletes" YOU CAN'T SPELL!Learn the English language you pile of chicken shit !It's NOW, you moron,not KNOW. You and your family are crap.

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grotesquexbetty

01:52 PMMay 07 2009

Athlete, though I wouldn't've put it so brashly I agree with you.

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DMT8162

08:16 AMMay 07 2009

Such a beautiful girl. Sympathies to the family. This IS how they should be able to remember her.

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AthleteInControl

03:03 AMMay 07 2009

LETS STATE THE FACTS This little **** takes daddy's car, is going over a hundred miles an hour, kills her stupid self and know Mr. Money bags daddyis mad cause the dumb bitch;s accident photos are on the net. I think it is an excellent way to make sure their precious dumb shit is made an example of.

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Dtrannyman

12:03 AMMay 07 2009

Life is a wonderful thing.... and death shouldn't be exploited. Good luck to the family. I hope the appeal is granted and they win. They deserve it..... something positive anyway.

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grotesquexbetty

09:55 PMMay 07 2009

At least from her death. I speak from personal experience when I say that losing a child is something you NEVER recover from. I hope her friends find ways to recover as well. However, like I said, I will NOT feel bad OR be "talked" into feeling bad for a girl who made several bad decisions in her life and had apparently no care to fix them. This was apparently NOT the first time she'd done cocaine, this was NOT the first time she'd taken the car out, and probably NOT the first time she'd pulled triple digits in a public area. People make decisions and the consequences hurt their families and themselves. Oh! I have an idea!! Let's just erase every picture of an 18 year old girl drunk at Mardi Gras flashing her boobs so her kids and grandkids won't be shamed too! Let's just pull EVERY inappropriate picture off the web so people can make horrible mistakes and then just erase them. Let's do that. I like that idea. --Tranny=Fail--

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What happened to 18-year-old Nikki Catsouras was so horrific, the coroner wouldn\'t let her parents see her body to identify her. Yet the image of their daughter in death is something Christos and Lesli Catsouras still can\'t escape, even 2 1/2 years after the tragedy.