U.S. right to use cell phone location data in Florida case: court
By David Adams MIAMI (Reuters) - Authorities did not violate a south Florida man's rights when his cell phone location data was used as evidence to convict him for his role in a string of armed robberies, a federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday. Lawyers for Quartavious Davis, who is serving a prison sentence of almost 162 years, argued at his 2012 trial that prosecutors had no right to use cell phone location data as they had not obtained a search warrant. The case is being closely watched as courts around the country wrestle with cell phone privacy issues. In a 9-2 decision, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a three-judge panel's ruling last year in the same court, concluding that Davis' right of privacy was outweighed by the government's "interest in promptly apprehending criminals." The business records of the MetroPCS Communications Inc service used by Davis did not reveal the contents of any calls, messages or personal phone information, the court found, or show any cell tower location information when calls were not being made. "The government did not seek, nor did it obtain, any GPS or real-time ... location information," the ruling said. "Davis had at most a diminished expectation of privacy in business records made, kept, and owned by MetroPCS; the production of those records did not entail a serious invasion of any such privacy interest," the court said. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) argued on Davis' behalf that the Fourth Amendment required authorities to show probable cause and a search warrant before seeing his cellphone records. During the 2012 trial, prosecutors used location data from cell towers along with testimony from accomplices to help convict Davis of seven armed robberies over two months in 2010. The dissenting judges warned Tuesday's ruling could give authorities access without a search warrant to other personal data on websites such as Facebook, YouTube, and even dating sites such as Match.com. They noted that the evidence against Davis included 67 days of cell data, including 5,803 separate calls and 11,606 location data points. "The amount and type of data at issue revealed so much information about Mr. Davis’s day-to-day life that most of us would consider quintessentially private," they argued. Davis maintains that he is innocent. He was the only one of the six men charged who went to trial. The others cut plea deals for sentences of nine to 22 years in prison. (Reporting By David Adams; Editing by Grant McCool)
