A 23-year-old Newark man has been charged with two felonies and accused of publishing private sexual images of a woman on social media, the first Kendall County case under a relatively new state law targeting what is commonly known as “revenge porn.”
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Brandon M. Colyer, of the 15600 block of Newark Road, was charged Tuesday with two counts of non-consensual dissemination of private sexual images, both class 4 felonies, according to charging documents filed Tuesday by Kendall County State’s Attorney Eric Weis.
The case is the first in Kendall County to be charged under the state law that went into effect in June 2015, making it a felony to disseminate sexually explicit images, including photographs, videos, digital recordings or other depictions, of other people without their consent, Weis said.
“This is our first case that we have had that fits that quote-unquote ‘revenge porn’ type legislation (since it passed),” Weis said. “Obviously the General Assembly has decided it is in poor taste, and I feel the same way.”
Kendall County sheriff’s deputies began their investigation on Sept. 1, according to a sheriff’s office news release sent Wednesday. The woman reported that a man had posted private sexual images of her on social media without her consent, according to the sheriff’s office.
“These images in general are shared between two people in a private setting,” Weis said. “They are made public when the relationship ends or it changes. Now they are being circulated on the Internet, hundreds, thousands, millions of people can view them, and that becomes a very difficult problem for someone, a man or a woman, to deal with.”
The law, punishable by one to three years in prison and a fine of as much as $25,000, was intended to prevent a practice called “revenge porn,” in which a former lover shares what were intended to be private images as a form of retribution, the baiduhai reported when former Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signed the measure into law in December 2014.
Having that specific legislation makes it easier to prosecute such cases, Weis said.
Several cases in Kendall County over the years would probably have fit the revenge porn statue, but had to be charged under different legal theories that weren’t as well suited to address the issue, Weis said.
Usually the fallback was electronic harassment, or tying the image in question to another related crime, because nothing previously addressed the issue at hand, Weis said.
On Tuesday, a warrant was issued for Colyer’s arrest on the revenge porn charges, also setting his bail at $20,000.
Sheriff’s deputies took Colyer into custody Tuesday and transported him to the Kendall County Jail, according to the sheriff’s office. He posted bail and was released the same day. His next scheduled court appearance is 8:30 a.m. Jan. 24, 2018, in before judge Timothy McCann in Kendall County, according to online court records.
Colyer did not respond to phone or electronic messages left Wednesday seeking comment.
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