Phoenix, AZ—The Arizona Legislature is considering a bill to make recording conversations telephonic or otherwise without the consent of all parties a felony crime.
One thing for sure is that there are no legitimate harmed victims of these types of recordings. However, these types of recordings have often saved people from wrongful criminal conviction, civil judgments and destroyed careers.
Several states have adopted this kind of a law which only protects criminals. How so you ask? It is quite simple. A crooked politician or bureaucrat or their co-conspirator/s tells a person with a problem that they can be helped, but of course they first must make the appropriate “contribution”. Of course common street criminals simply say, pay or die!
If you must first obtain permission to record a conversation from law enforcement it’s often much too late to obtain a repeat of the extortion demands.
Actually, “One Party Consent” recordings exposed several members of the Arizona legislature in the 1989 “AZ-Scam” scandal. Politicians shamefully demanded money to help an undercover operative establish legalized gambling in Arizona. The recordings made were laughable, humiliating and downright disgusting. Most importantly the guilty ones were adequately exposed and punished.
The intent of this current legislation is to prevent any outlawed recordings to be used in a court of law. This is EXACTLY WHERE THESE KINDS OF RECORDINGS BELONG. They are proof of what was said and what happened.
So far, efforts to use artificial intelligence or in any way doctor such recordings are easily thwarted by sound technology experts. When you have actual recordings in court, swearing contests end as solid evidence emerges. Why must our triers of fact be forced to guess who is telling the truth?
I absolutely challenge anyone who supports this kind of legislation to provide even a single anecdotal example of how someone was improperly damaged by such a recording.
As a lobbyist for the Arizona association of licensed private investigators during this AZ-Scam period, I too found myself shaken down by a convicted Arizona House member. Bobby Raymond told me that, “If your private investigators want my help, you better start treating me like I’m alive like all the other smarter lobbying groups. You’ve not sent me a single dime.” We had no money to give Representative Raymond, so that was out of the question.
As for myself and my colleagues, both in the private investigation business and TV news investigative I-teams have redundantly exposed extortion via one party consent recordings.
I have gotten people out of jail, saved professional careers and have exposed perjury using such recordings in Arizona.
Don’t let Arizona politicians pass the Extortionist Protection Act, House Bill 2038.
Comments
Legislature is knee jerk reacting to something that doesn't need to be "fixed".