Ex-Employer is Viewing My Personal Emails

My question involves civil rights in the State of: Washington
I was terminated from my position at a software development company owned by 2 owners each owning 50% each. A lawsuit sprung up between the two, one owner trying to form a coup. Since that all started I am many other employees were terminated on March 8, 2013.

Since I did not ever receive my final pay check I filed a complaint with the State of Washington Wage and Labor board. The attorney for the one owner who is trying to seize control over the other sent paperwork to the State of Washington (I received on May, 23 2013) stating the reason why I should not be paid.

The following is what I have seen them get access to. I have not given them the right to access any of the following information. Even if it is discoverable information, that is not what I am asking about. Did they have the right to have access to my personal information after they took my company computer from me on January, 23 2013.

They presented in the documents sent to Washington State context of personal emails using my personal gmail account in Google after they had confiscated my company computer.

There is much more to this than I have time to type out, but this is the most urgent too me.

They have the right to view anything that is on the company computer. If there are personal emails on the company computer, your bad.

The emails were not on my computer. They were on Google. They used my cookies I guess to gain access

You used the company computer to access the emails, correct?

yes

Did you save your password in the browser? It's my understanding that Google Mail cookies expire after two weeks.

If they were logging into your account, even if you saved the password on the computer, I think you could make an argument that it constitutes computer trespass in the second degree. Whether or not the police and prosecutor would agree, or would care enough to act on a report, isn't something I can tell you.

Have you changed your password yet?

They may have violated CFAA (Computer Fraud and Abuse Act) talk to your lawyer or contact the FBI to make a complaint.

Thank you and yes I have changed my password

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GMAIL cookies are set by the user

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Quoting darylprice

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GMAIL cookies are set by the user

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What do you believe yourself to be talking about?

Everything accessible on the company computer is legal for the company to look at. If you left gmail cookines on the company computer, you gave the company access to your gmail.

You can change your password now to prevent any future access, but all past access was legal. (Again, because you authourized it by leaving the cookies there.)

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Quoting eerelations

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Everything accessible on the company computer is legal for the company to look at.

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We aren't talking about files left on the work computer - we're talking about accessing files on a remote computer based (presumably) upon the person's saving his account information in the browser. The company knew it was not authorized to log into that account, post-termination, and they don't get a 'freebie' based upon the fact that the browser automatically populated the username and password boxes.

sounds like:
if you left cookiees or saved your account information and password pertaining to your bank account on the company's computer,
they have the right to access your bank account and look at all your personal information.
...is what everyone is saying

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Quoting zero2805

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sounds like:
if you left cookiees or saved your account information and password pertaining to your bank account on the company's computer,
they have the right to access your bank account and look at all your personal information.
...is what everyone is saying

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No, everyone is not saying that. A few people are ignoring the difference between information left on a computer and information on a remote server that is accessed without authority. However, the bank account information is a good example. If its not legal to log into someone's bank account just because you happened to run across their username and password, its not legal to do that with their email either.