Digital Trails Lead to Divorce
Tiger Woods has mastered every possible shot on the golf course, but one thing he hasn’t mastered is his own cell phone.
Cocktail waitress Jaimee Grubbs has produced over 300 salacious text messages that she received from Tiger. Las Vegas nightclub hostess to the stars, Rachel Uchitel, was texting Woods just before the auto accident. In fact, it may be those text messages that caused wife Elin Nordegren to chase Tiger out of the house and bash in his car windows with a niblick.
Don’t Put it in Writing
When are cheating spouses going to learn?
Many of us learned early in our business careers that you don’t put something in writing that may come back to haunt you later. If its a controversial subject, better to have an out with a “he said, she said” alibi.
If only Tiger had that alibi. It’s a lot harder to get caught if there isn’t physical evidence from text messages and emails.
Any form of electronic communication leaves a trail for the cheater to get caught. It may be a cell phone bill that you didn’t think your spouse ever read. And, if you send an email, you leave a digital imprint that won’t disappear even if you bash in your computer with a sledgehammer. That’s why digital forensics is such a big business.
In fact, text messages are much safer than emails. The carriers can’t save the messages forever when there are over two billion being sent daily in the USA. Verizon saves text messages for just five to ten days and AT&T saves them for just three days. While this may be a short window, if the recipient saves the message on her end, as Grubbs did, the sexting message has a life span as long as the cell phone itself.
Technology Makes Cheating Easy
Technology has changed the way of illicit affairs in marriages or dating. You don’t have to arrange a clandestine meeting in a hotel any more. You can keep in touch with your cheating partner in the convenience of your home via emails, instant messages, and text messages. And, this can all be done with your clueless spouse in the very next room.
“Infidelity is so much easier today,” said Ruth Houston, author of Is He Cheating on You?. “Now you can sit down in your home and click on a mouse and find a willing partner.”
Sites like Ashley Madison, a dating site for married people, has made it even easier to find bored partners who don’t want to leave their marriage, but want a little action on the side. It’s no wonder then that infidelity in marriages is increasing.
“Infidelity is definitely on the rise because of technology,” said Houston. “Women especially crave emotional intimacy. E-mail or chatting can start off innocently, but if there are actual connections, relationships develop quickly.” That man or woman you met at a business function or trade show could soon become an emotional affair and most experts agree that emotional affairs are more difficult to forgive than even sexual affairs.
Damning Divorce Evidence
Lawyers are certainly starting to get the message. More and more divorce cases are involving data communications like emails and text messages.
Christie Brinkley’s lawyer Robert Stephan Cohen said that data communications that become public can have a profound effect on how the court cases utlimately turn out and how friends of the married couple react.
“It’s much different than the rumor running around about a husband (or wife) at dinner with a babe in the back booth. It’s in a spouse’s face. They read it over and over again. Its harsh and hurtful.”
Just imagine how Elin Nordegren feels after reading all those sexting text messages.
