A Tucson YouTuber who pled guilty to stalking and harassing a city prosecutor's wife and is now accused of violating probation for posting more videos is pleading with the courts to clear him and treat his latest activity as protected free speech.
First Amendment experts have raised questions about whether the probation conditions go too far in restricting the YouTuber's free-speech rights and effectively enforce a gag order. But they also have noted that courts regularly uphold conditions for felons that they wouldn't for other civilians.
Lane Myers, 43, pleaded guilty to felony stalking and harassment charges in July 2025 against Shannon Walker, a former University of Arizona law school employee and the wife of Tucson city prosecutor Matthew
Walker. He was sentenced to probation, with conditions that forbade contact and limited what he could broadcast to YouTube.
In July 2026, he was booked into jail based on accusations that he had talked about Shannon Walker in YouTube videos again and distributed videos of Matthew Walker to other channels in violation of his probation conditions.
But Myers' attorney, Mark Resnick, has argued the Pima County Attorney's Office is going too far in its interpretation of the probation conditions. Myers should not be barred from ever talking about his case, he said, because that would unconstitutionally violate his client's First Amendment rights.
During a court hearing Aug. 11, Resnick said the county’s case was about not liking Myers’ speech. While Myers' content may be offensive, Resnick said, it was protected political expression nonetheless.
Myers' case raises questions about how far courts will go to suppress one person's speech to protect another person from harassment.
Understanding the legal questions
Myers' case highlights a gray area in First Amendment law. Though the U.S. Constitution protects offensive speech, Arizona’s anti-harassment law, like many in the nation, criminalizes repeated contact and communication that “seriously alarms, annoys, humiliates or mentally distresses” a reasonable person.
Since the First Amendment protects the vast majority of speech, judges have to determine when expression crosses the line into conduct. The more courts see the activity in question as conduct or behavior, instead of speech, the less protection it’s going to receive, said Brennen VanderVeen, attorney with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a free-speech advocacy group.
Myers maintains that his activity was always protected expression. Judges in his cases have acknowledged First Amendment implications but ultimately found his activity more in line with criminal conduct.
In Myers' latest case, since he already pleaded guilty to harassment and stalking, the question isn't whether he harassed Shannon Walker; it's whether he violated his probation conditions. And that invites another question: What speech rights can be taken away from someone who has pleaded guilty to felony charges?
What happens to speech rights for someone convicted of harassment?
First Amendment experts have said Myers shouldn’t lose all First Amendment rights.
Probation conditions that prevent someone from talking about their cases or about a city official — which Myers' conditions appear to do — are problematic, said both VanderVeen and Aaron Caplan, who formerly taught at Loyola Marymount University's law school in Los Angeles.
"Because that covers even saying things that are true or even saying things that are not harassing,” he said. Plus, “The ability to communicate with the government is an important aspect of democracy, and the First Amendment has something to say about it," he added.
Some of Myers' probation conditions include:
- "Do not engage in activities that would be reasonably expected to cause others to harass or contact the victim or her family."
- "Remove all videos that mention the victim or her family or include identifying information about them."
- "Do not post information about the victim, her husband or her minor children on YouTube or other social media."
While Caplan expressed skepticism over the broad and sweeping nature of the provisions, VanderVeen said courts have repeatedly upheld probation conditions that "limit constitutional rights in ways that would be absolutely unacceptable for someone not on probation."
Caplan said a judge would need to look at the specifics of Myers' case and decide whether the orders were necessary given the circumstances.
The years-long saga between Matthew, Shannon Walker and Lane Myers
Myers initially had grievances with Matthew Walker but eventually set his sights on Shannon Walker, too. She sought an injunction against harassment against him in 2024 after he left a voicemail calling her husband "crooked" and making YouTube videos about her that blamed her for his girlfriend's termination and showed her work phone number and address.
After a judge issued the injunction, the Pima County Attorney's Office pursued its own charges against Myers. The office accused him of misdemeanor harassment but also of violating the injunction, escalating what would have been misdemeanor crimes to felony aggravated harassment.
He was indicted twice by grand juries for a total of 20 charges. Though he was released after the first indictment, he was taken into custody after facing accusations of violating release conditions. He was not released after the second indictment, and after months of back-and-forth legal filings, Myers took a plea deal that let him out of jail.
He has since maintained his innocence and told The Arizona Republic he took the deal because he had been detained for roughly three months and was facing personal and financial pressures.
He laid low for about a year before starting up again on YouTube, leading to his most recent accusations. He has been in jail since July. His next hearing on whether he violated his probation is Sept. 14.
Taylor Seely's role covering First Amendment issues at The Arizona Republic/azcentral.com is made possible by a collaboration among Freedom Forum, Journalism Funding Partners and the USA TODAY Network. Freedom Forum does not provide editorial input.
Do you have a story about the government infringing on your freedoms? Reach her at tseely@arizonarepublic.com or by phone at 480-476-6116. She can be reached on Instagram at @taylor.azc.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: When does free speech become harassment? What the law says
