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Voyeurism & Sexting Defense
Phones and cameras have created a family of charges that didn't exist a generation ago — and Florida rewrote the main one in 2024, renaming “video voyeurism” to digital voyeurism and adding tougher penalties, including a full degree bump when the accusation involves family or household members. These cases run on devices, accounts, and assumptions about who recorded, who shared, and who knew — assumptions that forensic evidence can contradict.
If devices have been seized or a detective wants “your side” about images, stop talking and call or text 407-846-8008.
Digital Voyeurism — § 810.145
• The core offense: secretly recording, viewing, or broadcasting a person dressing, undressing, or privately exposing their body in a place with a reasonable expectation of privacy — or recording beneath or through clothing (“upskirting”) — for gratification, amusement, profit, or to degrade. A third-degree felony for adults (a misdemeanor for offenders under 19).
• Sharing the images: disseminating an image you know — or have reason to believe — was unlawfully created, for one of the statute's prohibited purposes, is its own third-degree felony; selling such images is another.
• 2024 enhancements: a repeat offense is a second-degree felony — and an adult offense involving a family or household member, or a position of authority or trust, is reclassified one degree higher across the board.
• Children and students: recording by a caretaker of a child under 16, by school employees of students, or by anyone 24+ of a child under 16 is a second-degree felony — and these variants carry sex offender registration. The adult-victim variants do not, which makes the exact charge selection a life-altering issue.
• Built-in exemptions exist for obvious and disclosed security cameras — the statute targets secret observation, and “secretly” is an element the State must prove.
Defenses track the elements: no reasonable expectation of privacy in the location; the device was disclosed or obvious; attribution (shared homes, shared clouds, roommates' devices); no intent for gratification or degradation (ordinary photos recast by an angry ex); and suppression where the phone search outran the warrant.
Sexting — Florida's Separate Track for Minors (§ 847.0141)
Florida deliberately built an off-ramp so teenagers exchanging images don't start life as felons:
• A minor's first offense is noncriminal — a citation resolved by 8 hours of community service, a $60 penalty, or a cyber-safety class.
• A second becomes a misdemeanor; a third a felony. All images within a 24-hour span count as one offense.
• The safe harbor matters most: a minor who receives an image unsolicited, doesn't forward it, and takes reasonable steps to report it has committed no violation. Parents: this is why panicked deletion and silence are the wrong move — documentation and reporting are the protection.
The hard line: this lenient track is for minor-to-minor conduct. An adult in image exchanges with a minor is in different statutes entirely — online solicitation, transmission of harmful material, or CSAM offenses, all serious felonies with registration. And teens whose images get forwarded around school can generate overlapping investigations where some kids are victims, some are cited, and some are overcharged — sorting which is which, fast, is the defense job.
Frequently Asked Questions
My ex says a camera in my own home was “voyeurism.”
Location, disclosure, and purpose are all elements. Household camera disputes — nanny cams, security systems, shared bedrooms during a breakup — are legally messy and often factually defensible; don't concede the narrative.
My teenager got a sexting citation. Does he have a record now?
A first citation is noncriminal — handle the conditions on time and it stays that way. Get advice before any school or police interview, because adjacent charges (not the citation) are the real risk.
Someone AirDropped images around the school and my kid saved one.
The safe harbor turns on not soliciting, not forwarding, and reporting. Act — with counsel — rather than hoping it passes.
Do these charges require sex offender registration?
The child/student voyeurism variants do; the adult-victim variants and the minor sexting track do not. Which statute the State files under is therefore often the central fight.
Device Cases Are Won on the Devices
Chad Seibel is a former prosecutor who knows what digital forensics can prove — and what prosecutors merely assume. Call or text 407-846-8008 for a free, confidential consultation. Office visits are by appointment only.