Friday's editorial in the Chicago Sun-Times about the case involving Tiawanda Moore recording police on her cell phone, called for the strengthening of eavesdropping laws to protect the rights of Illinoisans. Moore was recently acquitted of the charges violated the Illinois Eavesdropping Act for recording police who were persuading her to drop a sexual harassment complaint against another officer.
The investigators were not accused of doing anything illegal in the end, but that’s not the point. The point is that Moore reasonably could have thought they might have been on the verge of doing so.
Although Moore’s actions fell under the exemption, Cook County prosecutors tried to convict her anyway. One prosecutor even told jurors: “The content of the tape is not the issue. The issue is that the words were taped.”
Read the whole thing.
Read about our case challenging this application of Illinois’ eavesdropping laws.