Manhattan prosecutors finally have their hands on a stack of Twitter messages written by an Occupy Wall Street protester who was arrested for blocking the Brooklyn Bridge last year, The Post has learned.
Manhattan criminal court Judge Matthew Sciarrino turned over several pages of tweets Malcolm Harris sent around the time of his Oct. 1 arrest after reviewing them to determine if they were relevant to the prosecution’s case, according to Harris’ attorney, Martin Stolar.
“The judge turned over about seven pages of tweets to the DA,” said Stolar.
The office of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance subpoenaed Harris’ tweets in January, arguing that they might contradict information he gave to the police.
Harris was among 700 protesters charged with disorderly conduct for marching on the bridge. He claims that cops tricked protesters into trespassing onto the bridge — an argument prosecutors believe the Twitter messages will refute.
The criminal case took on added importance as it pitted social media against the interests of law enforcement.
Twitter, along with Harris, had fought the subpoena from prosecutors, arguing that the messages had been deleted and were no longer public on its site.
Sciarrino, however, said that the tweets were equivalent to shouting out an open window and that Harris didn’t have an expectation of privacy.
Bowing to the threat of a big fine, Twitter last month handed over the messages to the judge, who said he would review them and provide the relevant ones to prosecutors.
Twitter and Harris have two appeals pending that could prevent the messages from being submitted as evidence. Stolar said he would seek a delay of the trial set for Dec. 12 until the appeals are decided.