Being a sleazoid creeper legal — for now
Nobody on the Georgia Court of Appeals is saying that taking pictures or video up a woman’s skirt without her consent, or even knowledge, is an OK thing to do. (Well, that’s good to know … we suppose.)
What a 6-3 majority of the court did say in a July 15 ruling is that as Georgia law is currently written, this practice of “upskirting” is not illegal in many places frequented by the public, in this case a Houston County supermarket.
Writing for the majority, Judge Elizabeth Branch said: “Unfortunately, there is a gap in Georgia’s criminal statutory scheme, in that our law does not reach all of the disturbing conduct that has been made possible by ever-advancing technology.”
(At least as disturbing is that taking pictures up women’s skirts is apparently a common enough practice that there’s a popular culture term for it.)
The Houston County DA has asked the court to reconsider, and said he will probably appeal to the state Supreme Court otherwise.
The undisputed facts on record are that a former store employee named Brandon Lee Gary surreptitiously took video up a woman shopper’s skirt. Existing Georgia privacy law prohibits “the use of any device, without the consent of all persons observed, to observe, photograph, or record the activities of another which occur in any private place and out of public view.” The court majority ruled that “private place” refers to location, not anatomy. One of the dissenting judges wrote, not unreasonably, that “the victim had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the area under her skirt.”
Other states reportedly have encountered this problem and likewise concluded that existing law might be insufficient to punish it.
Let us at this point invoke a law that has long been on the books — the First Amendment — to note that Brandon Lee Gary and other low-grade predatory creepers make it grossly obvious that if there isn’t a law against the things such sleazoid losers do, there needs to be.
Excellent choice
On a more dignified note (not that the previous subject set the bar very high), we’re pleased to note the appointment of Rep. Debbie Buckner, D-Junction City, as vice-chair on a new House Study Committee on Historic Site Preservation.
The committee, recently appointed by House Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, will spend most of the remainder of 2016 taking a closer look at the effectiveness of state-sponsored preservation programs.
According to a Monday report in the Athens Banner-Herald, the panel, to be chaired by Rep. Chuck Williams, R-Watkinsville, “will periodically assess existing state programs to determine whether such programs continue to aid the cause of historic preservation or have failed that purpose.” It will then make recommendations for improving (or perhaps consolidating or eliminating) underperforming programs.
Both historic preservation and government efficiency are important concerns. Debbie Buckner will be an asset to this panel on both counts.
This story was originally published July 26, 2016 at 2:54 PM with the headline "Being a sleazoid creeper legal — for now."