Police overlooked a single underscore in a username, leading to an innocent man serving 18 months in prison, only to be acquitted on appeal.

A single underscore in a Kik messaging app username was overlooked by police, leading to an innocent man being convicted of child sexual abuse and serving 18 months in prison. The man continued to contest his conviction after completing his sentence, and the username mix-up was discovered while he was preparing his appeal. The Nova Scotia Court of Appeals found the man 'innocent in fact' and overturned his conviction.

2026 NSCA 59 (CanLII) | R. v. Klayme | CanLII
https://www.canlii.org/en/ns/nsca/doc/2026/2026nsca59/2026nsca59.html

A missing underscore sent innocent man to prison for 18 months - Ars Technica
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/07/police-missed-one-underscore-and-sent-the-wrong-man-to-prison/

The incident began in 2018 when a 12-year-old girl living in Wisconsin, USA, was communicating with an adult man through Kik. The girl's mother discovered inappropriate photos of the man on her smartphone and reported it to the police. The sheriff's office analyzed the device and confirmed that 125 messages had been exchanged between the girl and the adult using the username 'fus__ro_dah'.

However, when the police requested information from Kik to identify the user, they mistakenly inquired about 'fus_ro_dah,' which has one less underscore than the original 'fus__ro_dah.' In other words, one of the two underscores after 'fus' was omitted, resulting in a completely different account being targeted for investigation. Kik mistakenly provided the police with the email address associated with the specified account.

An investigation into Google's records regarding this email address revealed that it was accessed from a Canadian IP address. The investigation was handed over to police in Halifax, Canada, and inquiries to the internet service provider Bell Aliant led to Brandon Clem being identified as the subscriber of the IP address.

Police searched Mr. Claim's home and seized a smartphone and laptop from his bedroom. However, they found no evidence of a connection to the girl or any sexual images on the devices, and could not even confirm that Mr. Claim had accessed Kik during the period in question. Nevertheless, Mr. Claim was arrested in 2020 and charged with luring a minor under the age of 14 through communication, providing a child with sexually explicit material, and possessing child pornography.

In court, Mr. Claim was found guilty and sentenced to 18 months in prison in 2024. Mr. Claim served his entire sentence, but it is said that at the time of the trial, neither the investigators nor the defense noticed the mistake in the username.

The turning point came when Mr. Claim, after his release, continued to contest his guilty verdict and was preparing an appeal. According to Mr. Claim, it was only towards the end of compiling the grounds for appeal that it was discovered there was an error in the information disclosure request to Kik, and he realized for the first time that 'fus_ro_dah' had been requested instead of the correct 'fus__ro_dah.' This discrepancy was not communicated to the judge during the trial. In response to this fact, the prosecution also re-examined the case and changed its position to allow Mr. Claim's appeal. According to the appeals court, if a proper investigation had been conducted from the beginning, the evidence would have pointed to a different person named 'Jay' who was using a California IP address.

Ultimately, the Nova Scotia Court of Appeals acquitted Mr. Claim of all charges and overturned his sentences, including probation.

The court stated that 'Mr. Claim is in fact innocent and should not have been prosecuted in the first place, much less found guilty.' However, while the information regarding the username existed at the time of the trial, there was no evidence or explanation to confirm why no one discovered the error for such a long period of time.