The story reads like a cliché: A mother notices her daughter regularly returning home from school depressed, a protective instinct leading her to discover the problem’s root. The mother grows paranoid and turns over every rock, arriving at the conclusion that a classmate is to blame. She then defends her child’s happiness by eliminating the problem by whatever means necessary. It is the story of the Texas Cheerleader Murdering-mom, who drives too deeply at the heart of adolescent controversy, a world better left to sort itself out on its own indefinable, murky terms.

Today’s teens live out their social lives more publicly than ever before, turning the internet into the modern playground, exposing the confusing nature of their interactions to authority figures better suited to ignorance than involvement. The anonymity of social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace are tailor made to plans hatched with dangerous ulterior motives in mind.

Such is the case of Lori Drew, a 48-year-old mother in St. Louis, Missouri, who disguised herself as a 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans with a crush on 13-year-old Megan Meier. According to a police report, Drew’s MySpace avatar carried on a relationship with Meier for over a month as she set about discovering Meier’s opinion of her daughter.

ABC News reports that a neighbor told Good Morning America, “(Drew) did sit here in my living room and confess everything to me. She told me that they had pulled an image of a boy off the internet and that they had created an account using the name of Josh Evans, and she said she knew the last message that left her house that Monday when Megan attempted her life was that, 'The world would be a better place without you.'"

According to Tina Meier, the exact message Drew sent her daughter on October 15, 2006 was, “I don't know if I want to be friends with you any longer because I hear you're not nice to your friends.” Drew even posted electronic bulletins which, as Megan told her mother, said, "Megan Meier is a slut. Megan Meier is fat."

What would normally result in crocodile tears, at worst, was much more difficult for Megan Meier, who had a history of depression. She hanged herself in her bedroom closet on October 16, 2006.

Of issue now is whether Drew broke any laws, which police originally concluded she had not. But the Meiers are dissatisfied, as are others. According to ABC News, lawmakers in Dardenne Prairie, Missouri passed a law deeming “internet bullying” a misdemeanor.

"It's time that we do something against this. On all levels, the state and federal level," said Dardenne Prairie Mayor Pam Fogarty.

Photo from Malibu Chrissy