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Websites that publish mug shots and charge for their removal have defeated one lawsuit after the other, claiming First Amendment protection. But that defense to this shady industry may be about to burst. That's because a federal judge, ruling on a lawsuit by several arrestees suing Mughshots.com, just approved a novel class-action. It's one that takes legal advantage of the site's practice of displaying advertising links to paid removal services that the lawsuit claims are owned by Mugshots.com.
US District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman of Chicago didn't go so far as to say this vile practice amounted to extortion, as alleged. Instead, she ruled (PDF) that this likely amounted to a violation of the arrestees' right of publicity because the site was using the mug shots as actual advertisements for the paid removal service.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday September 30 2017, @10:35PM
I would assume it is everyone, not just convicts, but it could depend on the state.
Florida in particular [wired.com] has a series of Sunshine public records laws that require many forms of public records to be available by request, but PDs seem to just put the mugshots online due to their own policy. (Florida's public records laws may change because the people in charge are getting pissed off at Jeff Gray/HonorYourOath, Joel Chandler, and others.)
People who have been arrested but not convicted or charged could be the most likely to fall for the scam. If you are convicted, you are going to have employment issues no matter what, and are likely to be much poorer when you get out of prison. The straight edge arrestees that are let off the hook are going to be more intimidated by what they find on Google.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]