A California woman has admitted using her ex-husband’s Ring security cameras to secretly spy on him and his fiancée inside their own home.
Rayna Bell, 35, of San Diego, pleaded guilty to a reduced misdemeanor charge of eavesdropping using an electronic device after prosecutors accused her of remotely accessing cameras inside the Rancho Peñasquitos home of her ex-husband, Yantzy Villefranche, and his fiancée, Acacia Young.
The guilty plea came after prosecutors originally charged Bell with three felony counts tied to the alleged spying, according to court records.
Bell was sentenced to one day in custody, with credit for time already served, one year of probation and restitution to the victims in an amount to be determined later, NBC San Diego reported.
Prosecutors alleged Bell livestreamed more than 700 hours of footage from inside the home, capturing private medical and financial conversations as well as family members while they were undressed.
According to Young’s civil lawsuit, Bell and Villefranche divorced in 2023 after nearly eight years of marriage.
Villefranche later moved in with Young, and the couple installed seven Ring cameras around their home, including two indoors.
Young said she became suspicious after hearing a woman’s voice coming through one of the cameras.
‘It was his ex-wife’s voice,’ she told NBC San Diego.
The moment Acacia Young heard her fiancé’s ex wife Rayna Bell, 35, over the Ring security system in their Rancho Peñasquitos home
Young said the ordeal became so unsettling that the family moved to a new home and replaced all of their Ring cameras
Bell denied the allegations when they first surfaced, calling them a ‘smear campaign’ in court filings, before ultimately pleading guilty
Young said she later reviewed the Ring account and found more than a dozen saved clips containing Bell’s voice.
The lawsuit also alleged the account logs showed someone accessed one of the cameras for roughly 12 hours a day over a two-month period.
Bell denied the allegations when they first surfaced, calling them a ‘smear campaign’ in court filings, before ultimately pleading guilty.
Young said Bell’s admission finally brought relief after months of trying to prove what had happened.
‘Relieved, absolutely relieved, because we’ve been trying to convince everyone, you know, of the truth and now we no longer have to do that. She admitted it herself,’ Young told NBC San Diego.
Young said the ordeal became so unsettling that the family moved and replaced all of their Ring cameras.
‘We tried so hard to try to restore the peace, the security, the privacy. Once you are robbed of that, it’s almost impossible to try to restore that in your home,’ she told the outlet.
Young is pursuing a civil lawsuit against Bell.
‘You’re always going to feel like they can do it again, or if they had the opportunity, they would do it again,’ Young told NBC San Diego.
The Daily Mail has reached out to Bell’s lawyers for comment.
