New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft wins appeal to dismiss video in prostitution case

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft won another major victory in court Wednesday in his massage parlor prostitution case.

In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel in Florida’s Fourth District Court of Appeal in West Palm Beach affirmed a lower court decision that police improperly gathered video evidence on secret surveillance cameras that was crucial in the case against Kraft, 79, and two dozen other men who were recorded visiting and getting treatment at several South Florida spas, The New York Times reported.

“We find the trial courts properly concluded that the criminal defendants had standing to challenge the video surveillance and that total suppression of the video recordings was constitutionally warranted,” the judges wrote in their decision.

“In the absence of any binding Florida law concerning silent video surveillance like that conducted in this case, the trial courts properly applied well-settled and persuasive federal law on the issue,” Judge Cory J. Ciklin wrote.

Wednesday’s ruling upholds a 2019 decision by a Palm Beach County Judge Leonard Hanser, who ruled police detectives violated Kraft’s constitutional right against unreasonable searches, the Miami Herald reported. Kraft and the other defendants had challenged the legality of videos, caught by cameras installed in the massage parlors in Palm Beach and Indian River counties, according to the newspaper.

Unless Florida prosecutors ask the state Supreme Court to hear an appeal, Wednesday’s ruling ends the case against Kraft, who was charged in February 2019 with two counts of soliciting sex in a Jupiter spa, the Times reported.

“We are in the process of reviewing the opinion and will comment publicly at the appropriate time,” Mike Edmondson, spokesperson for Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg, told the Sun-Sentinel.

Kylie Mason, spokesperson for the Florida Attorney General’s Office, said the department is also “reviewing the ruling,” the newspaper reported.

The decision also ends the misdemeanor cases involving 90 men arrested in a Vero Beach sting operation, the Sun-Sentinel reported. Prosecutors also are now unable to pursue felony counts against the manager and two employees of Jupiter’s Orchids of Asia Day Spa, the newspaper reported.

“This ruling protects the constitutional rights and civil liberties of all the men and women who were illegally spied on in this case,” Kraft’s attorneys said in a statement. “More broadly, this ruling will further protect the civil liberties of all Americans, by helping prevent future 4th Amendment violations like those that occurred in this case.”

Cox Media Group