Sex Lies And $9 Million

The Revenge Porn Case That Shook The World

The first time police arrived at her home, Courtney Allen was elated. She rushed to the door alongside her dogs, a pair of eager Norwegian elkhounds, to greet them. “Is this about our case?” she asked. The two officers looked at her in confusion. They didn’t know what she was talking about. Courtney felt her hope give way to a familiar dread.

Three days earlier, in March 2015, Courtney and her husband, Steven, had gone to police headquarters in Kent, Washington, reporting they’d been victims of an online harassment campaign. They had found a fake Facebook page under Steven’s name with a profile picture of Courtney, naked. Emails flooded their inboxes; some called Courtney a whore and a bitch. One seemed like a death threat. Courtney’s co-workers received videos and screenshots of her naked and masturbating. The messages came from a wide range of addresses. Some even appeared to be from Steven.

There were phone calls, too. So many came to the dental office where Courtney worked that receptionists kept a log: “Called and said, ‘Put that dumb cunt Courtney on the phone,’” one said in neat, bubbly handwriting.

Courtney and Steven told a police officer they had seen who they believed was behind the harassment: a man in Arizona named Todd Zonis, with whom Courtney had engaged in an online affair that she had since broken off. The officer assigned them a case number and advised them not to have any more contact with Zonis.