Doe v. Bonnell

Where it standsWaiting on the spoliation ruling. Everything under it is stayed until then.

1. Right after she sued · April 2025

   Only about what happens while the case goes on

   Should he be ordered to take the video down before the case is decided?

   No · denied Apr 4 and Oct 6, 2025

   Six weeks after she sued, she asked the judge for an injunction, which is a court order telling someone to do something or to stop doing it, before anything in the case has been proved. She wanted him ordered to stop sharing the video, to take down any copies he controlled, and to tell other people in writing to take down theirs. She also wanted him ordered to keep all of his evidence.

   The judge said no to the emergency version the very next day, on April 4, 2025. Her own lawyer admitted most of the damage had already been done, and the judge said nothing was happening that wasn’t already happening when she sued. The rest of her request got a hearing in June 2025, where they both testified, and it was turned down on October 6, 2025. The court said she waited five months after the leak to ask, and that this is the kind of harm money can make up for if she wins.

   None of that decides the case, because it was only ever about what happens while the case goes on. So either way, the case carries on to the questions below. At that first hearing the judge also told her lawyers that if they thought he was getting rid of evidence, they needed to file a separate motion about it. They didn’t for another thirteen months, and that’s the spoliation motion further down.

   Either way

2. The law started on October 1, 2022

   The send both sides agree happened

   When did he first send the video?

   Apr 9, 2022 · agreed May 8, 2026

   The federal law she’s suing under only covers things done on or after October 1, 2022. A law normally isn’t retroactive, meaning it doesn’t reach back to things that happened before it existed. He has always admitted sending the video to one person over Discord, to an account called “Rose,” so the fight here was only ever about when.

   She sued saying it was October 2022. He said it was April 9, 2022, and showed screenshots of the same chat taken from both ends. His end says 4/9/2022. The other end says 10/04/2022, which looks like October 4. But the person behind “Rose” turned out to be a man in the UK, where dates are written day first, so that’s April 10, and it was already past midnight there. Another message in the same chat is dated 14/04/2022, and there’s no fourteenth month.

   In September 2025 the judge called the evidence on the timeline “murky at best,” and let her rewrite her complaint to add two other ways of getting past the date. Those are the two routes in the question at the bottom of this page. Then in May 2026 she agreed it was April 9, 2022. That’s about six months too early, so this send can’t carry a federal claim by itself.

   If October 2022

   Outcome

   That one send is enough

   Then

   Trial on the merits

   If the video had first gone out in October 2022, after the law started, that one send would be all she needed. The federal law would cover it, the court would have jurisdiction, which is its power to hear the case, and the question at the bottom of this page, about whether he shared it again later, wouldn’t matter.

   What would come next is a trial on the merits, meaning a trial about what actually happened and who is in the right. The big fight there would be over consent, since he admits he never asked her.

   If April 2022

3. The spoliation motion

   The case is here

   Decided first, and apart from the rest

   Should he lose the case for destroying evidence?

   Undecided

   Spoliation means destroying or losing evidence you were supposed to keep. The plaintiff says he deleted his side of conversations after he was told to preserve them, and that he swore a log was a full list of everything he sent one witness, even though his own messages show him sending her two links that aren’t on it. So she filed a motion, which is a formal request to the judge, asking for him to be penalized for it. He says nothing was actually lost, and that she filed it too late.

   The judge is deciding this first, and everything below it is on hold until he does. The most she asked for is a ruling that he is legally responsible without a trial on it, and that’s the yes on this card. If it goes that way, the question below never has to be answered at all. Anything less is a no here, and the case just moves down to that question. That covers the judge siding with the defendant, throwing the motion out for being late, or picking a smaller penalty, like the jury being told it can assume the missing evidence was bad for him.

   If yes

   Outcome

   Judgment against him

   Then

   Decided in her favor without a trial

   This is the most she asked for. The judge would rule that he is legally responsible without a trial on it, as the penalty for losing evidence he was supposed to keep. The rule she is relying on only allows that if he got rid of it on purpose, so that she couldn’t use it.

   If it went this way, the argument over what happened would be over, and in her favor. The question under it, about whether he shared the video again after the law started, would never have to be answered.

   If no

4. His two motions to end the case

   What the whole case comes down to

   Did he disclose the video after October 1, 2022?

   Stayed until that ruling

   This is the question the whole case comes down to. The federal law she is suing under took effect on October 1, 2022, and it can’t be used for anything that happened before that. Both sides now agree he sent the video to someone in April 2022, which is about six months too early. So she has to show that he disclosed it again at some point after that date. Disclose is the law’s own word, and it covers sending something, publishing it, or making it accessible.

   If she can’t show that, there is no federal claim, and a federal court has no jurisdiction, meaning no power to hear the case at all. She has two different ways of trying to show it, and those are the two routes inside this card. A yes on either one makes this a yes. He has asked the judge twice to end the case on exactly this point, first with a motion to dismiss in September 2025 and then with a motion for summary judgment in January 2026. Both are stayed right now, which means the judge has put them on hold until the spoliation motion above is decided.

   Who must prove itShe does. The burden is on the plaintiff, and she has to meet it by a preponderance of the evidence, which just means more likely than not.

   A yes on either one is enough

   Route A · The November 2023 transmission

   Could a jury credit an untested declaration?

   Undecided

   This is her first way of getting past that date. She says he sent the video a second time in November 2023, to a witness who goes by “Abbymc” online. That would be thirteen months after the law took effect, so if it happened, it counts. He says it never happened, and points to his own saved logs of what he sent her, where the video doesn’t show up.

   What she has is two declarations from Abbymc, which are sworn written statements, saying she received it. She also has a message Abbymc sent a friend that same morning. Whether that’s enough is the question this card asks.

   This is the test Route A has to pass. To credit a statement just means to believe it. A declaration does count as evidence, but Abbymc herself has never been questioned by either side. She never sat for a deposition, which is sworn questioning outside of court. She handed over nothing when she was sent a subpoena, which is a court order to produce documents or testify. And a few days after signing her first declaration she told the defendant she didn’t want to be involved anymore.

   So the judge has to decide if a reasonable jury could still believe her on paper alone. If it could, the two sides have a real disagreement about a fact, and only a trial can settle that. If it couldn’t, Route A is closed.

   or

   Route B · Continuing accessibility

   Does “make accessible” reach a private link?

   Undecided

   This is her second way, and it doesn’t need a second send at all. The law doesn’t only cover sending or publishing a video. It also covers making it accessible. The copy he sent in April 2022 stayed reachable until he deleted it in November 2024, and he has admitted that under oath.

   So her argument is that even though the sending happened too early, leaving it reachable went on for about two years after the law took effect, and that this counts as a disclosure all by itself.

   This is the test Route B has to pass, and it’s about what the words of the law mean, not about what happened. He never posted the video anywhere public himself. He sent it to one person privately, and even her own expert agreed the link was basically impossible to guess. The defendant says that isn’t making something accessible in any real sense, and that she is stretching one message from April 2022 into something that lasts for years so that a newer law can reach it. She says the law says “make accessible,” not “publish,” so it doesn’t have to be public.

   No court has applied this law to a private link like this before, so whichever way the judge goes, it will be a first. If she wins this one, the federal court keeps the case even if Route A fails.

   If yes

   Outcome

   Federal jurisdiction survives

   Then

   Trial on the merits

   If either route works, she has a disclosure after the date, and the federal court has jurisdiction, which is the power to hear the case at all. What comes next is a trial on the merits. That means a trial about what actually happened and who is in the right, instead of about whether this court can hear it.

   She would go into that trial in a strong position on the main issue, which is consent. He admits he sent the video, and he has testified that he never asked her. He says permission was implied by their earlier exchanges, but the law asks for consent that was actually given.

   If no

   Neither route · The April 2022 transmission only

   Outcome

   No federal claim

   Then

   Case ends here

   If neither route passes its test, the only sharing anyone has proven is the one from April 2022. That’s about six months before the law took effect. She used to argue it happened in October 2022, but in May 2026 she agreed that the real date was April 9, 2022.

   A law normally doesn’t apply retroactively, meaning to things that happened before it existed, so that one send can’t support a federal claim.

   With no disclosure after the date, there’s nothing left under the federal law, and a federal court can only keep a case that has a federal claim in it. She also has claims under state law, but those are only in this court because they came attached to the federal one. So when the federal claim goes, the state ones are dismissed along with it, and the case is over in this court.

   That wouldn’t be a ruling that he did nothing wrong. It would be a ruling that this court isn’t allowed to decide it.