Bob Clark and Everyday Law welcomed returning guest, Ron Schwartz to talk about the secret use of GPS trackers by lawyers, investigators and litigants. The practice seems prevalent in domestic relations cases particularly ones involving heated child custody disputes.
What is intriguing is that this practice has resulted in Ron filing lawsuits on behalf of the individuals who are being spied on by their former spouses or partners, for invasion of privacy. These lawsuits have resulted in quite substantial settlements despite the fact that no definitive case law exists in Maryland concerning whether GPS tracking constitutes an invasion of an individual's reasonable expectation of privacy.
The concept of intrusion upon seclusion undergirds these claims and a recent Maryland Federal Court decision clarifies that such claims may go to trial and are not precluded. The definition is "intentional intrusion upon the the solitude or seclusion of another or his private affairs or concerns that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person."
One interesting aspect of these legal claims is that they are being made against the party on whose behalf the tracking is initiated, their lawyers and the investigators who provide and/or place the trackers.
Stay tuned for more of these breach of privacy tort cases in differentiated fact patterns, For more go to: https://www.maryland-law.com/blog/gps-tracking-invasion-of-privacy-intrusion-upon-seclusion.cfm
To Listen go to: https://everydaylaw.podbean.com/e/tracking-devices/
