When high schooler Lucy Stevenson’s godbrother used AI to create an explicit video of her—based solely on a photo she posted to Instagram at 16—the Pensacola teen’s family was stunned to learn he couldn’t be criminally charged.
A new Florida law would change that.
HB 757, approved by Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday, makes it a second-degree felony to nonconsensually generate, possess, or promote sexual images or to do so with intent to harm. It's a third-degree felony to knowingly solicit or view these images.
This closes a dangerous loophole in current law, which only criminalizes Floridians who promote, transfer, or share explicit AI images—not create them.
The measure's signage, inspired by Stevenson's case at Pensacola High School, came a week after President Donald Trump greenlit similar legislation making it a federal crime to publish or threaten to publish explicit images—AI or not—of a person without their consent.
This anti-revenge porn legislation, called the "Take it Down Act," was pushed by First Lady Melania Trump.
Pensacola's "Deepfake" Child Porn
18-year-old William Stafford downloaded social media pictures of high school girls and "undressed" them using artificial intelligence, the Pensacola News Journal reported.
One of those girls was Stafford's godsister Stevenson, daughter of attorney Eric Stevenson. In March, she spoke in front of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee to tell her story.
“In my image, I was 16 years old working at the Christian summer camp, and I was with a fellow counselor, and again, it was taken from our private Instagram accounts and edited into child pornography," said the high school senior, the student body's Vice President.
"The law did not do anything to him because he did not send the pictures out," she continued. "He had just stored them on his phone, and his ex-girlfriend was the one who sent them to everyone… So she got in a bunch of trouble, but nothing really happened to him, which is why I’m in support of the bill to prevent it in the future and to hold people like him accountable.”
The Pensacola News Journal reported that one victim believed Stafford had over 175 images of between 30 to 50 high school girls, though not all of them were edited to show them nude. Many of the girls were between the ages of 16 and 17.
Florida's new law, signed without fanfare on Tuesday, will take effect Oct. 1.
