Lakeville PI to Sue State for Taking Illegal Peeks at Her Driving Records

A Lakeville private investigator is suing the state after she noticed that her driver's license records had been accessed by various state agencies a total of 166 times since 2003.

The Pioneer Press wrote a front story about Hilary DeVary's detective agency in 2006, and within two days of publication 11 law enforcement agencies, two state departments and the U.S. Postal Inspector’s office had accessed DeVary's records a total of 35 times, the Star Tribuneis reporting.

“Why, if there’s a photo [in the paper], do you want to go further and find out where I live?” DeVary told the Star Tribune. “And that is what is so incredibly frightening.”

DeVary started sleuthing around and checking her file when she learned that her records had been breached a Department of Natural Resources employee.

She doesn't believe all 166 views of her driver's license records, which include photos and addresses, were illegitimate—some likely stemmed from her renewing her license and others were related to traffic infractions—but there was a clear pattern of search spikes after she was mentioned in the news.

The Star Tribune has more about similar privacy violation lawsuits:

It marks the 10th federal lawsuit over misuse of driver’s license data filed in Minnesota against local governments and state agencies in just over a year.

[...]

Former St. Paul police officer Anne Marie Rasmusson sued a year ago claiming that more than 140 officers throughout Minnesota had breached her file; she won more than $1 million in settlements from local governments, as well as reforms to the system. Since then, the litigation has become rampant.

Minneapolis City Attorney Susan Segal said the federal statute that protects driver data has not been widely interpreted by the courts nationally. Questions remain, for example, about how damages are calculated.

“We are going to try to get some reasonable rulings out of the court,” Segal said, speaking generally. “Because while people have an absolute right to expect that private information in the hands of governmental agencies is only going to be accessed appropriately, it’s another thing for people to get a windfall out of taxpayer dollars.”

DeVary plans to file suit in court on Thursday.