Unless the subjects were underage, I can’t imagine how that could be a crime. :dubious: Kicked out of the gym, sure. But arrested & prosecuted? Methinks your “friend” left out a few details, there.
And I’m with others who’d appreciate a cite about how taking photos of bridges, power plants, etc. became explicitly illegal after 9/11/01.
Would you be happy if somebody took naked pictures of you for their “own use” without your knowledge? I cant understand how you can defend this.
I don’t know what the law is, or was, except that there seems to be much confusion. I can contribute this tidbit:
As of several years ago, I saw signs posted on government offices (specifically, Social Security offices) prohibiting taking pictures in or of the building. More recently, I read somewhere (most likely here on SDMB) a thread saying that such laws had been overturned. Still more recently, late last year, I visited my local Social Security office and noticed that those signs were no longer there.
My conclusion: Perhaps there really was some new development, in which such laws were either overturned or found to not exist at all, resulting in the removal of already-existing no-photo signs at government offices. FWIW.
It’s not clear to me that there are laws against photographing infrastructure, but the authorities do harass people about it from time to time, and they may be keeping an eye on people who take such pictures.
I am not “defending” this. My friend prettymuch got justice. Of course, had he been more circumspect, he would not have been caught and turned in. I can imagine that some of this kind of thing does go on and most of these offenders do not get caught. The area where you genuinely can have a reasonable expectation of privacy is shrinking by the day.
You must not have a good imagination. That does not seem like an invasion of privacy? I can’t say it applies to all 50 states but it certainly does in New Jersey. Specifically 2C:14-9. And I can’t think of a justification why it shouldn’t be illegal.
Hey, we’re still waiting for the OP to tell us why there should be an unlimited and inviolable First Amendment right to photograph an unwilling stranger in her bed.
Ditto, because I can’t figure it out either. Anyone?
Whatever the actual charge was, if you had even skimmed the article you would have known the issue wasn’t simply photographing someone (as your OP implied).
I suppose one would get arrested quick, fast and in a hurry if they took a camera near Area 51 and started snapping pictures. Just a guess on my part though.
A crime where you don’t get caught is still a crime.
This article mentions a possible motive:
Having a photo of her current condition could elicit more sympathy for her if Cochran is having an affair.
I have F.I.'d people who were acting odd while taking pictures of things like this, but there are no actual laws against taking pictures of those things. The people I had F.I.'d could have told me to pound sand. In fact, one guy did.
F.I.'d?
nm
The only way you would get arrested, is if you were on the facility proper without authorization. Any images that you might have taken would be a secondary charge. Back in the day, you could have taken pictures of the facility, or what purports to be the facility, with a long lens on a mountain that was adjacent. Now the airforce bought that land, you cant do that any more.
Not to mention that the good stuff, is probably in Alaska now.
Declan
No, it doesn’t matter. If he trespassed, let him be prosecuted for trespassing. If he broke in, let him be prosecuted for that. But the story says he was arrested for taking a picture. Which is what I’m asking about.
I can’t find the Mississippi law they’re talking about, the story says he was “accused of exploiting a vulnerable adult and illegally and improperly obtaining a photo of her without her consent for his own benefit.”
Most of that is gobble-gook. For example: what’s illegal is defined by the law. It might as well say “it’s illegal to do something illegal.”
And mostly pretty much everything people do is for their own benefit.
Except in this particular case. It sounds like he may have been doing it for the benefit of the guy running against the Mississippi senator.
“A picture is worth a thousand words.”
Have some common sense and just give a warning and tell him to not do this , and drop the charges.
If its across a boundary it is slightly across a boundary , its the sort of boundary testing someone may do.
Also he is a self-appointed journalist, so he may use a journalists defense, ‘public interest’ and so on.
