Upskirting the Law

Lawmakers support upskirt photos?  Another great example of knee-jerk lawmakers being more interested in making a statement than making a workable law.

A court threw out a conviction for taking "upskirt" photos. The law only applied to nude or partially nude victims. A person wearing a skirt is neither.

Good idea to change the law. But in the rush to put a new law on the books only 24 hours later, Massachusetts lawmakers voted to prohibit secret pictures of "sexual or intimate parts."

In the rush, they failed to realize this still does not impact upskirt photography if the subject is wearing underwear.

To view this vague terminology of "intimate parts" otherwise, secret photos at the beach are also prohibited. A bikini bottom is as revealing as most underwear (or more so). Does this law prohibit all beach photography?  Or is a bikini bottom not showing something sexual or intimate? What about dancewear? 

The difference is that the person wearing a skirt in public has a reasonable expectation of interior privacy above her hem. But there is a difference between "intimate parts" vs. "intimate wear", and the new law failed to include the latter.

No one may be required to speculate as to the meaning of a penal law. Everyone is entitled to know what the specific law commands or forbids.  That is what the Supreme Court ruled. 

In their rush, the lawmakers failed to make the necessary change, and upskirters will still get their cases tossed out of court.