Almost one year to the day after her arrest on Oct. 27, 2010, the is scheduled to begin Friday in .
Closely followed by parents, Facebook users and residents of New Canaan and beyond, the unusual incident that prompted Buhl's arrest touches on underage drinking, sex, social media, Internet privacy and parenting.
In June, 2010, her boyfriend at the time, a New Canaan resident, and his then 17-year-old daughter, reported to that someone had gained access to the daughter's personal journal and posted excerpts on Facebook.
Containing sexually explicit information, accounts of underage drinking and other personal information, the entries were from a notebook, which father and daughter said she kept in the bedroom of their home.
As the investigation continued, according to an affidavit application filed with the court by Sgt. Carol Ogrinc of the New Canaan Police Department, the Facebook account creation and postings were traced to IP addresses associated with Buhl's Optonline Internet service subscriber account at home on Locust Avenue in New Canaan, as well as to a computer at New Canaan Library.
When confronted with an additional copy of the embarrassing material she had sent the girl's father by mail, Buhl, a former reporter for Greenwich Time newspaper and a freelance business reporter, told Officer Dan Gulino, "that she is investigating the underage drinking problem in New Canaan," according to the court documents.
In May, Buhl , effectively ensuring that her case would go to trial. She faces charges of second-degree harassment, second-degree breach of peace and interfering with an officer.
Although she has , Buhl has continued to write about New Canaan, the NCPD and her concerns about underage drinking.
A call to the attorney who represented Buhl at her last appearance, Christopher W. Caldwell, was not returned.
The Connecticut state attorney's office in Norwalk declined to comment.
[Editor's Note: The headline on this article was updated following Patch's interiew with Caldwell—see comment below. The language describing IP addresses also was supplemented for clarification.]
