A wife in the canton of Aargau has been convicted of a criminal offence for going into her husband’s email account and reading and downloading information without his knowledge.

https://www.thelocal.ch/20171220/swi...usbands-emails

When you feel the urge to read OH's e-mails without their permission, the level of trust is already very, very low...she could have asked her spouse for a divorce without doing anything illegal.

but, he had affairs with several women for some time. Who is most at fault??? I can't believe he sued her for this. Is she not entitled to know whose body fluids she is sharing?

what if she only suspected the affairs, if there were no affairs maybe she didn't want a divorce?

For divorce under Swiss law "fault" has normally zero relevance (Art. 112 and 114 Swiss Civil Code https://www.admin.ch/opc/en/classifi...ndex.html#a112). Exception if there was violence, fraud, and some other clause (Art. 115 Civil Code https://www.admin.ch/opc/en/classifi...ndex.html#a115). But infidelity is not an exceptional reason. https://www.weka.ch/themen/recht/sch...-moeglich-ist/

If she has no trust she can request a divorce anytime. Also in case of "just because". No reason needed.

No. If she does not trust the partner she should have either no, or only protected sex.

__________________
"I think so, Brain. But where are we going to find a gallon of whip cream and three yards of lederhosen at this time of night? Narf!"

I wasn't talking from a law perspective, I don't know if everything can always be so black and white. I think there are some quite 'clever' people who can hide affairs, so are you saying that anyone who suspects something is different with their partner should not have sex or divorce them as they might be a liar, hiding an affair, suffering from a mid-life crisis (not saying this includes affairs), or mental health issues?

and what about if she was going through a period of low self-esteem, and then become a bit paranoid? She should ask for a divorce?

obviously, this would be heaps easier to discuss in person. I find it interesting to see other sides of the story, and am not having a go at you, just discussing it!

At a company I used to work for, I definitely felt like I was in the minority, as I was one of the few married people there that wasn't having an affair. I believe most of the partners were unaware, or maybe they were aware and ignored it.

At least one should not resort to illegal means to find the truth. Infidelity, having and hiding an affair is not illegal under Swiss law.

Edit: Read the linked news report. Looks like the wife at least tried to find out if it is illegal and may have discovered that in that particular case it is a gray area and might be illegal.

also, he was either stupid, or wanted her to find out as he kept the same password that she knew.

very grey to me, if I suspected an affair I'm sure I would do the same and would feel totally justified, IF he was, and this guy was! If he wasn't then I would be very sorry for my mistake.
Don't worry, I'll let my husband know tonight
I'm guessing when they married they made a contract to be faithful to each other, even though it is not a legal issue I still think he was wrong not to tell her and then to be able to keep it a secret, and sue her for discovering his secret.

The law is clear and must be respected; Whether she was morally right is a completely different argument (FWIW I think she was)

The thing is that this was not so a clear cut case:
- they had a shared computer.
- she saw an email account in the system she did not recognize
- she tried hubbies default password which he used for the shared account as well and it worked. (How stupid is this guy?)

I find the ruling harsh - after all did the guy behave gross negligent to say the least to protect his data (and his marriage).

So you have no problems abusing his trust to find out if it's still earned. Regardless of the outcome, by doing so you've just broken his.

What should he do if he didn't cheat when he finds out? Should he just shrug it off? Or did you just kill the relationship yourself?

In addition they should both have been convicted for stupidity! One reuse known passwords on the new email account and the other leaves a history searching to see if what they were about to do was illegal.....

I dare say that if he hadn't actually been cheating, he would hardly have dragged his wife to court after she read his e-mails. Nice of him to not only cheat on his wife, but also have her convicted. Beautiful human being. I hope the divorce will cost him a fair bit of money.

The ruling is ridiculously harsh, particularly for this country where others walk free and pay next to nothing for actual rather horrific crimes.

Is he an idiot of epic proportions by using the same passwords all around on a shared computer no less? You bet. Is it morally right to read others' e-mails? No. Is it something that needs to be punished by law in this particular situation? Not in my book.

“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement.”
- Gandalf/Tolkien, Fellowship of the Ring

If she suspected the affairs she could have confronted him, do people never talk these days?I can't imagine someone having a double life being able to hide it for too long. Or they never knew each other very well in the first place, that's a possibility too.

Anyway, apparently not only was she concerned about the legality, but she also knew the answer before reading his e-mails. I too happen to be of the same opinion, that the law is too harsh in this case, or applied too harshly, but it doesn't help to discuss this. She can take the case further and appeal the decision, pretend or ask for psychological damages, set a legal precedent of exception from the law etc. Don't know, I'm not a lawyer.

I have to say I think the law is stupid. If you lie and cheat you deserve to be found out, and if the only way to find out the truth is by reading someone else's emails or SMS, What'sapp etc then so be it.

If you can't trust your partner then you can't trust them to tell the truth when confronted, what choice do you have? Is it ok to hire a private detective to follow them and spy on them, but not read emails?

Aren't you mixing law and morality ? Law needs to be fair. And impartial. And blind, if the need be. Morality is a different matter altogether.

"Criminals thrive on the indulgence of society's understanding." - R'as Al Ghul.

Law is simply codified morality.