What Can We Learn From 50 Cent? Understanding Florida’s Revenge Porn Laws

This one’s a doozy….

It all started in 2009 when the rapper 50 Cents posted a sex tape featuring Lastonia Levinston and her then-boyfriend, Maurice Murray, online as a way of getting back at his rapper-rival, Rick Ross. Fifty (that’s what we’ll call him) inserted himself into the footage and added in a soundtrack of two of his songs (yikes!). The video was up for about an hour and racked up 3M views. Levinston sued and Fifty was ordered by a Manhattan jury to pay her $5M in damages. Days later, Fifty filed for bankruptcy, then unsuccessfully sued his lawyers for malpractice for $32M and finally, lost another $2M in punitive damages to Lastonia. This revenge porn case is not the same as his case with Teairra Mari (you’d think after one revenge porn case you’d do things differently…ah, not Fifty!)

Anyhooo, so what can we learn from this dumpster fire?

Understanding Florida’s Revenge Porn Laws

We can learn all about Florida’s revenge porn laws.

As expected, Per Florida’s Statute § 784.048, Cyberstalking is a crime. It’s not permissible to post or distribute intimate photographs, images, or videos of another person on the internet or other form of electronic communication, without the person’s consent, in order to harass or upset them. This is what we call “revenge porn.”

The statute also allows victims of revenge porn to file a civil lawsuit against the offender, seeking to prevent additional postings (injunctive relief), provide a remedy after the crime has been committed (actual damages or $5,000 in damages, whichever is greater), or both.

For example, if the perpetrator posted revenge porn online that meets the statute requirements and the victim can prove damages, the victim may ask for the cost of psychiatric treatment, lost wages for missed work, or moving costs. In short, Florida law allows $5,000 in damages as the minimum damage award for a victim.

Additionally, Florida is one of 13 states that requires both parties to consent to being recorded in the first place (the other States require a single party consent). Even if the porn isn’t published online, if one party is unaware of the recording, in Florida, this is a crime.

So, there you have it, folks. We learn that revenge porn is probably not worth the satisfaction of seeing your ex miserable and that it’s always better to learn from other people’s mistakes!