[SarahW]

NO, the kid should be charged with making a false report, and any results of the false report should affect disposition of the charges, or sentencing.

Pecuniary loss or loss of reputation can be addressed in civil court.

The willful choice to leap off a bridge and end his life was the proximate cause of death, not indignity of being falsely accused.

An investigation was in process, and it cleared the man.
He might at least have waited for the investigation to conclude. He hadn't the character or faith in God to endure. This was not caused by the false accusations. He wasn't pushed. He chose his own death. No one chose that for him but himself.

If anything, I take from his plunge that perhaps the report was perhaps not *wholly* false, even if there was a recantation.

Whatever the truth, he had other means to fight the false accusation and to recover his losses. He chose the wrong path, the weak path, the selfish path.

[MissAmericanPie]

I'll still go with the manslaughter charge. Some people are very sensitive, to failure, to condemnation, to seeing everything they have worked for implode. Knowing that even if he is cleared, the taint will always follow him. Charge a few liars with time and alot of false accusers will find something else fun to do that won't cost them.

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. That is one of the Ten that can land one in the pit. This story is a good example of why you don't bear false witness against your neighbor. It's such a bad thing to do that God thought it important enough to place in the ten commandments, it's so important that it carries a death sentence, so a charge of manslaughter for a teen seems a small price to pay to society for his crime against an innocent man.