Vermont v. Lizotte

At issue before the Vermont Supreme Court in this case centered on whether defendant Stuart Lizotte’s Fourth Amendment rights were violated when his online service provider, AOL, searched his transmissions, detected suspected child pornography, and sent information to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), which opened the email and attachment and provided it to law enforcement. The Supreme Court concluded AOL was not acting as an agent of law enforcement when it searched defendant’s transmissions, and that NCMEC and law enforcement did not expand AOL’s private search by viewing the file already identified by AOL as containing child pornography. In addition, any expansion of the search by opening the related email did not invalidate the warrant because the other information in the affidavit independently provided probable cause to search. View "Vermont v. Lizotte" on Justia Law