Upskirting Okay in Oklahoma
The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals, Oklahoma’s highest court for criminal matters, has ruled that upskirting is perfectly legal in public places in Oklahoma.
The ruling came in the case of Riccardo Gino Ferrante who was busted in Tulsa in 2006 for slipping a camera underneath the skirt of an unsuspecting 16-year-old girl in a Target store and snapping away.
Ferrante was charged under a “Peeping Tom” statute that requires the victim to be “in a place where there is a right to a reasonable expectation of privacy”
Court testimony indicated Ferrante followed the girl, knelt down behind her and placed the camera under her skirt while the two were inside a Target store. The appeals court ruling holds that a store is a public place and therefore no reasonable expectation of privacy exists.
The court in its ruling says basically that “if you are in a public place, you are fair game” for someone to cram a camera into your crotch and snap away to their heart’s content.
Don’t believe it?
Tulsa County Assistant District Attorney Steve Kunsweiler had this to say about that, “I think reality is today and I hate to say it, but women need to wear pants wherever they go, until we get this addressed.”
Tulsa legislator Pam Peterson is trying to fix the wording of the existing law, but don’t count on it unless a lot of angry Okies are on the phone to their legislators demanding action and soon.
In the meantime, ADA Kunsweiler probably has the right idea in recommending women wear pants.
After all, this is Oklahoma and there are a lot of perverts here already with undoubtedly more on the way thanks to this silliness on the part of our courts…
Wait a minute. If this girl lifted her OWN skirt in a store, showng her underwear (or whatever) she would be charged with indecent exposure, right?
Besides, she was underage, a minor. Doesn’t THAT const**ute certain charged in of itself? Something like lewd, lascivious behavior toward a child?
The girl was 16 years old. Oklahoma’s lewd acts statute, 21 O.S. 1123, applies only to children under 16. Manufacturing child pornography applies to making pictures or movies of any child under 18. However, Oklahoma defines child pornography as pictures or movies of sexual acts or of the “uncovered genitalia”. So an upskirt picture of a girl’s underwear would not qualify because the genitalia are covered. The Oklahoma County DA’s office is working with the legislature to change that and other aspects of the child pornography statute.
Think all that doesn’t make sense? How about this – In 2005, OCCA (Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals) reversed an almost identical case that had been prosecuted as Outraging Public Decency. (“[Walmart] security personnel believed Appellant was taking pictures by placing the PDA, which contained a camera, between the legs of women wearing skirts, unbeknownst to the women.”) Cornelius v. State, M-2004-0255 (Okl.Cr. 2005).
In Cornelius, OCCA held that the State should not have prosecuted the Defendant under the Outraging Public Decency statute but instead should have charged him with the Use of Clandestine Video Equipment statute, 21 O.S. 1171(B), which is exactly what the Tulsa Co DA’s office did in the Ferrante. Apparently, OCCA has now decided that statute does not fit either.
This is one of the times when a girls brothers, father, or uncles should find the guy and have a little “discussion” with him on appropriate behavior toward women. That’s one of our biggest problems in society now. The husbands, fathers, brothers and uncles are more than willing to sit on their a**es and act like a bunch of sissies, while perverts like this guy only get a slap on the wrist from the courts.
I have a suggestion of sorts. Get all of the under 18 year old ladies to go commando when they wear skirts, and then the Child Pornography statute will take effect.
Yeah, I know, it’s a stupid idea. Girls, wear pants until the legislature gets their act together.