privacy defamation recording maryland
Is it legal to record your parents at home?
<p>Is it legal for a minor to make an audio recording of his parents engaging in abuse?</p>
<p>If so, is it also legal once that child is an adult for him to publicize those recordings?</p>
<p>Interested in U.S. law, but if state is necessary use Maryland.</p>

<p>Per your comment responses, Maryland is a two party consent state which means that the other party must consent to your recording IF there is a reasonable expectation of privacy.  In one's own home is generally considered a place where one has this expectation and thus these recordings are problematic.   Depending what you intend to do with them, I would first contact a lawyer to get legal advice as to how to handle this before you publish them.  If you are looking to file a criminal complaint (and assuming statute of limitations hasn't run out) the prosecutor may be willing to not prosecute you for violating 2 party consent law because you were trying to gather evidence of someone else's crime, but it's not a guarantee (though this will look bad on the prosecutor come election season).</p>
<p>If you are suing your parents it might not be admissible as evidence but I can't specifically say that either.</p>
<p>If you are using it to show other people in the same situation what to look for it's probably best to find another set of recordings as these ones carry a lot of legal issues that will come back to bite you if you release them.</p>
<p>Finally, while not legal, your parents may not want to pursue the criminal recording side of this matter if they are aware of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect" rel="nofollow noreferrer">&quot;Barbra Streisand effect,</a>&quot; wherein actions taken to ensure something isn't viewed by the public cause that something to gain wider viewership than if they never bothered trying to censor it.</p>
