Six Months’ Probation for a Crime Carrying a 4-year Minimum Sentence

That’s the unusual plea deal that Tadrae McKenzie struck earlier this year in a case involving a “stingray” – a controversial device being used by law enforcement around the country to track individuals’ movements and phone calls.

For more information on how these devices operate, click here.

During the course of his trial, McKenzie’s defense attorneys sought information on how exactly the police had tracked his location.  When the judge took the unprecedented step of requiring state prosecutors to demonstrate exactly how a stingray (also called “cell site simulators,” “dirtboxes,” and “IMSI catchers”) worked, they offered McKenzie a deal he couldn’t refuse to avoid disclosing information about the device.

Fourth Amendment in the Digital Age - April 3, 2015

Revenge Porn: Spurned Lovers’ Retaliation in the Digital Age

View image | gettyimages.com

One of the biggest scandals of 2014 was the leak of several celebrities’ nude photographs to the internet this past September by hackers, who obtained the photographs from the celebrities’ iClouds.   The media was bursting with news about the photographs and statements from female celebrities like Jennifer Lawrence and Kate Upton. 

However, celebrities are not the only victims of these kinds of violations; they happen to women everywhere, all the time.  Spurned ex-lovers can easily and anonymously post nude photographs and videos acquired while in an intimate relationship with another to the Internet on a variety of sites created just for that purpose.  The practice is known as “revenge porn,” and it has been a highly relevant topic among legislators, criminal law practitioners, and feminist advocates following the recent scandal.