The Dooms had never been in trouble with the law. On Aug. 12, 2004, they found themselves being accused of activity that disgusted them.

But the police had the wrong house, based on mistaken information from the Dooms' Internet service provider, Cox Communications.

Now, Brian and Sarah Doom are suing Cox for invasion of privacy, breach of contract, defamation of character and "outrageous conduct."

The lawsuit emphasizes the tension emerging in recent years between the privacy of Internet customers and the ability of police to chase crimes down the electronic information highway.

"Cox did make a mistake, and we are sorry for that action," said Sarah Kauffman, Cox spokeswoman. "But due to the pending lawsuit, we are prevented from commenting further."

The suit was filed both in Kansas and in Georgia, where Cox maintains its headquarters.

The Dooms say Cox should have been able to protect their privacy from an unwarranted raid by police. They are asking for unspecified damages, including lawyer fees stemming from their dealings with police and emotional distress.

"These are good people who were accused of crimes that sickened them," their lawyer, Craig Shultz, said. "Their neighbors saw the police show up and take them away. It destroyed their week."

The Dooms, according to the lawsuit, were aggressively interrogated about the child porn accusations for hours. They kept telling police they were innocent. Police confiscated the couple's computer.

"It scared them," Shultz said. "They didn't know what was happening."

The Dooms paid lawyer Dan Monnat to represent them.

Near the end of the week, police told the Dooms of the mistaken information received from Cox.

"Cox apparently had gotten a subpoena, which we haven't seen," Shultz said.

The court order, Shultz said, asked for a home address connected to an Internet address police suspected of receiving child porn. Shultz said that someone at Cox typed in an Internet address different from the one provided by police.

"And the Dooms' home address came up," Shultz said.

Included in the lawsuit is the claim of "outrageous conduct." It's a rarely used legal claim that contends a party suffered damages so severe that it would be "regarded as atrocious and utterly intolerable in a civilized society."

Shultz said that the Dooms aren't blaming Wichita police.

"From all indications," Shultz said, "the police did everything correctly."