Charlotte Laws

After completing high school at The Lovett School in Atlanta, Georgia, Laws attended the University of Florida in Gainesville and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She moved to Los Angeles in 1981 and completed bachelor's degrees in Theatre (1985) and Philosophy (1996) at California State University, Northridge (CSUN). She earned two master's degrees from the University of Southern California (USC) in Professional Writing (1986) and in Social Ethics (1997), as well as a Ph.D. in Social Ethics (2000) from the University of Southern California. In 2003, she completed post-doctoral coursework at Oxford University, England.

Laws during a television interview in June 2009.

Laws studied acting at the Academy Theatre of Atlanta, Joe Bernard's Acting Studio in Las Vegas and the Estelle Harman Actors Workshop in Los Angeles. She worked as a model and actress in movies and television until her late 20s. She has performed as a stand up comic at The Comedy Store in Los Angeles.

In 1988, Laws authored the best-selling book Meet the Stars, which details how the average person can succeed in the entertainment industry. She promoted the book on Larry King Live, Oprah Winfrey, The Late Show and over a hundred radio and television shows throughout America and Canada.

From 1997–2000, Laws wrote for the British magazine Mad Dogs and Englishmen and since then has become a syndicated columnist. Her articles on current events, politics, philosophy and social issues have been published in the "Los Angeles Daily News," "E the Environmental Magazine," "The Huffington Post,"[20] "Opinion Editorials," "Los Angeles Times," Jezebel (website), "Gawker," "Newsweek," "Salon (website)," the New York Daily News,[21] and "The Washington Post."

On April 11, 2015, Laws' memoir titled Rebel in High Heels came on the market. The book details her fight against revenge porn and the first 22 years of her life.

Her book Devil in the Basement was released on March 14, 2018. This nonfiction novel is about Laws' grandfather, who was murdered by devil worshiper Ernie Yost in 1948.[22] The book also spotlights the rampant prejudice directed at Italian-Americans in the early twentieth century.[23] The Associated Press ran a feature article about the book in January 2018, which appeared in newspapers across the country, including the Los Angeles Times, U.S. News & World Report, the Washington Times, and the Chicago Tribune[24]

On August 15, 2019, Laws's second memoir, "Undercover Debutante: The Search for My Birth Parents and a Bald Husband," was published.[25] The book won a Publisher's Weekly book award and covers Laws's life from age 22 until 39 just after she rejects her adoptive father's bribe of $500,000 to remain in Atlanta and instead moves to Los Angeles almost broke. This humor-filled book explains how the author tracked down her birth family and found a husband after a number of disastrous boyfriends. It also includes some of the author's celebrity escapades; there are stories about Ben Affleck, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Milton Berle, James Brown, Bill Cosby, Governor Jerry Brown, Liberace, Julio Iglesias, and Tony Bennett, among others.[26]

Laws made Buzzfeed's list of the 30 fiercest women of 2013.[27] and Brainwreck's list of 20 women who changed the world in 2013.

Laws plays Human #46 on the 2020 Netflix series, "100 Humans."[28]

In January 2012, after an unreleased topless photo of Laws' daughter, Kayla, was posted on the revenge porn website, Is Anyone Up?, Laws began an investigation of Hunter Moore, who ran the site. She also contacted the FBI, who launched their own investigation of Moore and his website.[29] Laws determined a large number of the photos on the site had been hacked. She contacted dozens of victims and became known as the "Erin Brockovich of revenge porn."[30][31] Laws appeared on Nightline, MSNBC, CNN, NBC, CBS, TMZ on TV, Fox News and the Dr. Drew (TV series) to discuss the issue. Laws detailed her revenge porn battle in the online publication, Jezebel,[32] and the article received over 1.2 million page views. Her experiences were further detailed in her book, Rebel in High Heels, which was released in April 2015.[33][34]

Moore removed his website in the midst of the FBI investigation, but announced on November 28, 2012, that he would start a new site that would include address information. This prompted Laws to make Moore's home address public on Twitter,[35] and Moore threatened to ruin her life. She soon received death threats, computer viruses, and a stalker appeared at her home.[36] Internet hackers professing to be affiliated with Anonymous came to her aid, hacking into his servers and posting his personal information on the Internet.[37]

The FBI arrested Hunter Moore and his hacker, Charles Evens of Studio City, California, who went under the alias of "Gary Jones", on January 23, 2014. On February 18, 2015, it was announced that Moore would plead guilty to federal computer hacking and identity theft charges. He faced up to 7 years in prison and a $500,000 fine. However, in the end, he got two and a half years in federal prison.[38]

With no plea deal in place and facing 42 years in prison, Moore's hacker, Charlie Evens, confessed his crimes to CNN on tape at Laws' house (when CNN was interviewing Laws for a segment). The taped confession aired on April 27, 2015.[39] In the end, Evens got 26 months in federal prison.[40]

On June 4, 2013, Laws gave testimony before the California State Senate in favor of SB 255, a law designed to protect victims from revenge porn or "cyber rape," a term Laws coined. The bill was sponsored by State Senator Anthony Cannella of Modesto, CA[41] and it was signed into law on October 1, 2013, making California the second state (after New Jersey) to pass a law designed to help victims of nonconsensual pornography. Until 2018, Laws was a board member of the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative (CCRI),[42][43] an organization dedicated to helping victims of online harassment.[44] Since 2012, Laws has been meeting with state and federal legislators, urging them to pass laws to protect victims. Today, 46 states and Washington D.C. have anti-revenge porn laws, and Rep Jackie Speier (CA) introduced a federal bill in July 2016 called the Intimate Privacy Protection Act, but nothing happened with it. Then in 2017, Speier and several other legislators, introduced the Ending Nonconsensual Online User Graphic Harassment (ENOUGH) Act.,[45] Nothing happened with this. Then, a federal bill called The SHIELD Act (Stopping Harmful Image Exploitation and Limiting Distribution) was introduced in 2019.[46]

In addition to pushing for a federal anti-revenge porn law, Laws has recently been tackling the problem of deep fake pornography and sextortion.[47][48] She claims to have assisted over 500 victims of nonconsensual pornography, morphed porn (or deep fakes) and sextortion since the inception of her activism in 2012.[49][48]

Charlotte Laws is a political analyst and has worked as a BBC News contributor since 2015.[50][51][52][53][54][55] She has also made appearances on the Al Jazeera network,[56][57] and she participated in a Reddit AMA in September 2015 with Rick Wilson (political consultant).[58]

Laws was the first person to publicly discuss “hidden Trump supporters” and to call Trump a feminist and a pacifist.[59] Some of her controversial articles about Trump and politics have appeared in The Huffington Post,[60][61][62] CityWatch, and The Daily Caller. She stated in 2019 on BBC television and Twitter that she is supporting Cory Booker and Tulsi Gabbard for the 2020 election.[63]

On November 30, 2014, Laws spoke out about her "34-year-old Bill Cosby secret." In a Salon article,[64] she detailed her experiences with Mr. Cosby and a friend she calls "Sandy." Laws claims that Mr. Cosby drugged "Sandy" in 1981 and had sex with her. Laws was interviewed on the Dr. Drew Show[65] on December 1, 2014 about this issue. In a Fox News interview, Laws pondered whether Cosby has somnophilia.[66]

In March 2015, Laws came to defend the LGBTQ communities when a Southern California attorney proposed a statewide ballot initiative that permitted the execution of gays by "bullets to the head or any other convenient method."[67] He called it the Sodomite Suppression Act. In response to what is widely seen as a vicious and repugnant attack on LGBTQ people, a traditionally oppressed minority, Laws registered a rebuttal initiative with the Attorney General's office, "The Intolerant Jackass Act". Laws’ proposal called for sensitivity training and a steep fine for anyone submitting a state initiative related to the killing of gays.[68] In June 2015, the initiative was cleared to move forward, but Laws said that she did not plan to gather signatures, adding "I'm glad my proposal made an impact. My intent was to send a message and support gay rights. [The proposal] has served its purpose."[69]

Laws was voted the fourth most notorious party crasher in the world, beating Bill Murray, Queen Elizabeth II, Serena Williams, Lady Gaga, and the Salahis.[70] She says gate crashing began as a hobby when she was a teenager, but later became a creative way to get face time with business leaders, politicians, and A-list celebrities in order to lobby for legislation, get exclusive interviews, and obtain business partners.[71] She has crashed the Secret Service four times[72] and calls some of her schemes the “Fake Out to Get In” ploy, the “Glitz Blitz,” and the “Celebrity Snuggle Up.” [73]

Laws’ 1988 how-to book, Meet the Stars, is believed to be the first party crashing book ever written.[74] Laws also includes some of her gatecrashing techniques in her memoirs: Rebel in High Heels (2015) and Undercover Debutante (2019).[75]

Laws, a former Atlanta debutante,[76] was adopted at birth and tracked down her birthparents in her late twenties, saying, "You can never have too many parents."[77]

Prior to acting and writing, Laws was employed in a number of other jobs. She was a cab driver, private investigator, bodyguard, backup singer for an Elvis imitator, nurse, fashion designer, aerobics instructor, antiques shop owner, and president of a mid-size legal corporation. Laws was a lecturer for the FBI in Quantico, Virginia in 2006[78] and has also been a licensed realtor since 1987.[79]

In April 2015, Laws went public about her three-year romance with singer Tom Jones in her memoir, Rebel in High Heels. She says he was her first boyfriend and that she dated him from age 18 until age 21.[80][81]

She married English barrister and California attorney Charles Parselle in the 1990s and has a daughter named Kayla Laws, who is an actress.[82] She also has three rescue dogs and six rescue chickens[83] and calls herself a Jewish Jain.[84] Laws’ father-in-law, Thomas Parselle, was captured by the Nazis during World War II, transported to a German POW camp and witness to the notorious break-out attempt as depicted in the movie, The Great Escape.[85]

In 2012, Laws' chicken, Mae Poulet, was a write-in vice presidential candidate. She was selected by a dog from Tennessee to be his running mate on the Bully ticket.[86] Mae Poulet was also involved in a 2011 fundraiser with actress Natalie Portman and actor Jason Alexander to raise money for poultry in need.[84] In March 2013, Mae Poulet was inducted into the National Museum of Animals and Society.

Laws' grandfather, Tucker Moroose (a lawyer and aspiring U.S. Senator), was murdered by a devil worshiper in Fairmont, West Virginia in 1948. The story is detailed in Laws' book, Devil in the Basement.[87][88]

In July 2019, Laws admitted in an article that she committed a crime which may have violated the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act when she conspired to rescue pigeons.[89]