Inset: Rayna Bell in court. Background: Ring camera footage showing Rayna Bell’s ex-husband being spied on in his California home (KNSD/YouTube).
A California woman has admitted to using her ex-husband’s Ring cameras to spy on him, with court documents saying she livestreamed more than 700 hours of the man and his family from inside his home.
Rayna Bell pleaded guilty last week to a misdemeanor charge of eavesdropping using an electronic device, according to court records. She was ordered to pay restitution as part of the plea deal and must serve one day in custody, with credit for time served and one year of probation.
A request for a “domestic violence restraining order” filed by the ex-husband, obtained by local NBC affiliate KNSD, accused Bell of “unlawfully accessing” her ex’s private Ring camera system last year and linking his account to half a dozen Amazon Alexa devices that were registered to her.
“[Bell] viewed video footage for approximately 44,640 minutes — an average of 12 hours per day — over the span of two months,” the request said. “These devices include cameras inside and outside my home, including our children’s rooms. Her unauthorized access violated both my privacy and the safety of my household.”
The ex-husband and his family told KNSD they first noticed something was wrong after hearing a voice coming from one of the cameras.
“It was his ex-wife’s voice,” recounted the man’s fiancee, Acacia Young. “We tried so hard to try to restore the peace, the security, the privacy. Once you are robbed of that, it’s almost impossible to try to restore that in your home.”
According to the restraining order request, the footage that Bell “live viewed” and recorded included “deeply personal and private moments, such as my fiancee breastfeeding our newborn, nudity and partially undressed footage of our children … in vulnerable settings.”
The recordings were “deeply invasive” and deemed as possible child exploitation by the ex-husband, according to KNSD.
“[Bell] also accessed and recorded confidential household conversations, including private discussions between my fiancée and me regarding our finances, credit card numbers, banking details, Social Security information, medical records, medical health history, and other protected health and identity-related data,” the request charged. “Her conduct constitutes a serious invasion of privacy and potential identity theft.”
Bell did not respond to KNSD’s requests for comment. Her ex-husband plans to take legal action against her in civil court.
“You’re always going to feel like they can do it again,” Young said. “Or if they had the opportunity, they would do it again.”
