A woman accused of being a getaway driver in a series of robberies in St. Louis has changed her plea from guilty to not guilty after finding out that a stingray was used in her case.

Wilqueda Lillard was originally set to testify against her three other co-defendants, whose charges were also dropped earlier this month. As a result of changing her plea, the local prosecutor dropped the charges against her on Monday.

Terence Niehoff, Lillard’s attorney, explained to Ars that she pleaded guilty before learning about the use of the stingray. When her co-defendants’ attorneys challenged a police detective during a deposition, and that officer refused to provide further information, the case was eventually dropped.

"They won't go to trial because they don't want to explain this stuff, so they ended up dismissing it," he said.

Relatively little is known about how, exactly, stingrays, known more generically as cell-site simulators, are used by law enforcement agencies nationwide, although new documents have recently been released showing how they have been purchased and used in some limited instances. And cops have lied to courts about their use. Not only can stingrays be used to determine location by spoofing a cell tower, they can also be used to intercept calls and text messages. Typically, police deploy them without first obtaining a search warrant.

The Lillard case marks yet another example of a baffling prosecutorial strategy suggesting that federal and local authorities are more interested in preserving the secrecy surrounding stingrays, or cell-site simulators, than actually prosecuting crimes.

It is highly likely that the St. Louis Police Department has a non-disclosure agreement with the FBI along the lines of one recently revealed in a court case in Erie County, New York. In that case, a rare unredacted form demonstrated the full extent of the FBI's attempt to quash public disclosure of stringray information. The most egregious example from the document showed that the FBI would prefer to drop a criminal case in order to protect secrecy surrounding the stingray.

Lauren Trager, the spokeswoman for the St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office, has previously denied to Ars that dropping the previous three cases had anything to do with preserving stingray secrecy, but this claim seems highly unlikely.

"I don't buy it either—there is no other logical reason to drop this case," Niehoff said. "They had confession, they had the whole nine yards."

Trager did not respond to Ars’ question as to why the Lillard case was dropped.

"That's what's so bizarre about this: you're using techniques that you don't want to disclose—what's the point of gathering evidence if you're not going to use it?" Niehoff added.

UPDATE Wednesday 11:30pm CT: Trager eventually did write back to Ars.

"As I mentioned, those cases are now closed records under Missouri law," she e-mailed. "Therefore, I am unable to provide the information you requested. Despite the opinion of the defense attorney in this matter, the dismissal of the cases was not related in any way to any technology used in the investigation."

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