Man tells MA Supreme Court it's his constitutional right to take "up skirt" photographs

[cali]

A Massachusetts man claims he has the constitutional right to take "upskirt" photos of women in public.

Michael Robertson, now 31, was arrested in 2010 after trying to take cellphone photos up women's dresses on the Boston subway, according to the Boston Herald.

The Andover man is charged with two counts of photographing an unsuspecting nude or partially nude person, the Eagle Tribune reports, and faces more than two years in jail if found guilty.

Monday, Roberton's lawyer, Michelle Menken, argued before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court that Robertson did not commit a crime because his right to snap photos up women's skirts is protected under the First Amendment.

<snip>

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/06/michael-robertson-upskirt-photos-constitutional-right_n_4226928.html

Incredibly, there's precedent for this:

On a warm summer day two years ago, a 16-year-old girl put on a skirt and headed to the SuperTarget in her hometown of Tulsa, Okla. As she shopped the air-conditioned aisles, a man knelt behind her, carefully slid a camera in between her bare legs and snapped a photo of her underwear. Police arrested the 34-year-old man, but the charges were ultimately dropped on the grounds that the girl did not, as required by the state's Peeping Tom law, have "a right to a reasonable expectation of privacy," given the public location. In non-legalese: Wear a skirt in public, and you might just get a camera in the crotch.

<snip>

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/25/surge-in-upskirt-photogra_n_146532.html

the law was changed in Oklahoma, so maybe this sleaze won't get away with this

[gopiscrap]

1. pervert

[frazzled]

2. Do women have a right, then, to ...

kick him in the balls? I mean, after all, going out in public with your balls out there in your pants is just asking for it.

[sarisataka]

9. It sounds like a freedom of speech issue to me

so kick away...

[frazzled]

16. Taking someone's picture without their permission is not free speech

This is an intrusive, abusive invasion of someone's privacy. There's no defending it under any circumstances. Sheesh.

[sarisataka]

18. I meant...

the kicking in the balls as a freedom of speech. If I saw a man taking a picture up my daughter's skirt, or any other woman rally, I would re-enact my high-school soccer days when we would try to see from how far away we could kick the ball into the net. I was able to do 70 yards then but think I am still good for forty.

[frazzled]

20. Ah, then we're good!

I normally don't advocate violence, but the act of taking a picture up the skirt of a woman is pretty violent/violating, so an eye for an eye, as they say.

When I was young (and that was some time ago) and living in NYC, I used to take the A train home after working late. Inevitably (I can't tell you how many times this happened), some creep would walk up to where I was sitting and flash me. I started carrying an umbrella at all times (this was before today's foldup umbrellas; it was a long one with a point), and when a guy in a coat started to come near where I was sitting isolated on a train, I'd just take my umbrella and point it towards the nether regions of the creep's physique, and they would just turn and walk the other way! No violence, but the threat was clear!

[GreenStormCloud]

23. You stated it over broadly.

If you are walking on the sidewalk and I take a picture of the front of a store and you happen to be in it, I don't need your permission. You were not in a place where you had any reasonable expectation of privacy.

A woman has a reasonable expectation of privacy under her clothes, so upskirt pictures are an invasion of her privacy. Free speech doesn't cover it.

However, if I am filming a street scene and a good looking woman walks through the scene, I don't need her permission. Now if a stray gust of wind, with no help from me, lifts her skirt up then she has been exposed to public view. Her expectation of privacy was briefly lost, until she can push the skirt back down. If she was filmed during the gust of wind, it is not the photographer's fault. He has not invaded her privacy. That's how paparazzi make a living. Disgusting, but legal.

[frazzled]

24. Actually, if you're filming a woman walking down the street

and you want to use her image in your documentary, you have to get a rights clearance, signed by that individual, in order to use it in your film. Unless you're just creepy and want to watch the film of the woman walking by yourself, in your basement , while ... .

[GreenStormCloud]

25. Not what I said. I said filming the street and she walks through the scene.

Take a picture of a crowded street. Do you really have to get a rights clearance from hundreds of people? How come paparazzi don't get rights clearances?

[gollygee]

3. Wow

I wonder if DU's libertarians think the right to take pictures up women's, and apparently girls', skirts is protected.

[Uncle Joe]

19. A most stupid statement or question.

D.U. libertarians would be the first to protect a right to privacy, that would most certainly include anything under a skirt woman or girl, but I can't help but to believe you know or should know that.

[Dash87]

4. So people should expect pervs to take pictures up their skirts?

Dumbest court decision ever.

[onehandle]

5. Sounds like the same argument that gun nuts use to try to take guns everywhere. nt

[badtoworse]

8. There is a much better argument for that in the 2nd Amendment

[840high]

6. It would be my right to

kick him in his family jewels.

[badtoworse]

7. He should be imprisoned for being an asshole.

[joeybee12]

10. If he's wearing the skirt, yes...if it's on anyone else...no

And his lawyer...yup, all lawyers will do anything for a buck.

[seabeyond]

11. bottom feeders. and a culture that supports them. nt

[Xipe Totec]

12. He won't have any problem having his picture plastered all over the media then

With the caption "pervert".

Freedom of expression cuts both ways.

[Johonny]

13. This

++++

[zazen]

14. in pornography, women's bodies are men's protected speech

Like with Dred Scott 160? years ago . . . there's this misconception that denying masculinists (of both genders) the right to use others' bodies to communicate the idea that those occupying the role of gender female deserve to be violated is denying them the right to free speech. As MacKinnon was the first to point out, it's similar to the mid-19th century case, when the SCOTUS returned Dred Scott because to not do so would violate "property rights."

Individual property and speech rights do not extend to include other human's bodies.

Maybe the KKK could start taking photos of random black people and posting them to their web site compare their supposed attributes as plantation workers or something, using the same racist tropes we find in pornography. THEN we would see some outrage. It's no different than this sonofabitch feeling that women's private sexuality belongs to him as his natural right. Black people are not mine to photograph evaluate for my personal use to prop up some notion that I'm superior because I'm white. Women are not this man's property to furtively photograph for his personal use.

But he's brainwashed into thinking it's "biological" and he's a radical, free-speech kinda guy. Wonder where he got that idea.

[bigdarryl]

15. He will have a better argument on the US Supreme Court

With those five nut jobs especially Clarence

[Blue_Tires]

17. Holy damn...AND his attorney is a woman??

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

21. Michelle Menken....or Michelle Malkin?nt

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

22. I wonder what name he uses when calling Jay Severin and Howie Carr. nt

[ZombieHorde]

26. Total asshole. nt

[ismnotwasm]

27. Is anyone surprised?

I'm not.