privacy liability north-carolina
Advice about being secretly taped
<p>I need to know if you can sue someone for pain and suffering after being secretly audio taped in North Carolina.  </p>

<p>No. Causing someone "pain and suffering" is not against the law; it is merely one kind of damages that can be awarded when someone <em>has</em> done something that is against the law.</p>

<p>You may, for instance, endure pain and suffering from a car accident or shooting, in which case you could collect damages for your pain and suffering after proving that the other party committed the torts of negligence or battery, which are illegal.</p>

<p>But if you were enduring pain and suffering from the last episode of <em>Lost</em>, you could not collect damages for your pain and suffering because it is not against the law to write a crappy finale.</p>

<p>So in your case, cannot sue for pain and suffering based simply on the existence of a secret audio recording. North Carolina allows secret audio recordings, and it does not make exceptions for audio recordings that hurt someone's feelings.</p>

<p>But to go beyond your explicit question, there still remains the possibility that you could pursue a legal action. If the other party used that recording in a way that violated the law, that might give rise to a tort that would support an award of damages for pain and suffering. If they publicly distributed a recording of themselves having sex with someone, that might constitute the tort of public disclosure of private facts. If they edited the recording to make it sound like someone had said something that they had not and then gave it to someone else, that might be grounds for a libel action.</p>
