My question involves criminal law for the state of: Maryland and Federal
I have reviewed the Reporter's Recording Guide that was referenced in another thread. The guide outlines the law for taping phone calls. Still, it left me with a couple questions. Based on what I read ... Federal law allows recording of phone calls and other electronic communications with the consent of at least one party to the call. However, Maryland is an All-Party consent state which is contrary to Federal law. As a non-lawyer I find this problematic. Would not Federal law take precedence in court?
If someone records a telephone conversation as one-party consent in Maryland, and the conversation is never used or disclosed by the one-party, what would the damage be ... where is the injury? I would like to read some case law (civil or criminal) regarding this if someone can point me in the right direction.
Thanks.

If you were a lawyer advising your clients with the position you gave above you would put your clients at risk and perhaps get you dinged for malpractice. If a statute says it is illegal to make the recording itself, then simply making the recording violates the law regardless of what use you make of the recording. If it was the use that mattered, the statute would say so; Congress and state legislatures know how to write such statutes after all. It's like a law that prohibits running a red light. I have seen people argue that it is not illegal to run a red light if there is no one else around because then there is no risk of an accident and no one is harmed. But that is clearly not what the law says. The law says it is illegal to run a red light. Period. If you run a red light you may be prosecuted and fined/jailed even if there was no other car around in a 100 mile radius. It is the same thing with these evesdropping laws: most of them make the act of recording it a crime in itself, and thus under those statutes it is irrelevant what use you made of the recording. 