Upskirt Vids from D.C. Metro Reportedly Posted to xHamster

CYBERSPACE—There currently may be scant legal recourse for victims of an upskirt video shooter who is reportedly stalking unaware females on the D.C. Metro and posting the videos to the xHamster tube site, but that is not stopping the Metro Transit Police from investigating the reports, which first appeared yesterday in a post on Popville.com, a blog that covers D.C. neighborhoods. The Washington Post picked up the story today, getting an official comment on the situation from Metro spokesperson Caroline Laurin, who characterized the videos as “disturbing” and said transit detectives are “aware of the matter and are investigating." Riders, she added, should immediately report any such incidents to police. In the original post on Popville, the anonymous poster wrote of the upskirt videos on xHamster, "They appear to be smartphone videos of young women – usually wearing shorts or skirts – who are unaware that they are being filmed, often taken from low angle. Not technically explicit – and, due to the obnoxious rulings earlier this fall in Texas and DC, almost certainly not illegal, unfortunately – but, certainly creepy. To be clear, I have no fundamental issue with pornography (obviously); but, that’s premised on the consent of anyone being filmed, which clearly seems to be lacking here.” The D.C. ruling referenced in the post was made in early September, when "Superior Court Judge Juliet McKenna dismissed charges against Christopher Cleveland who was accused of taking pictures up women's skirts without their consent or knowledge at the Lincoln Memorial." The Texas ruling was from last year. As AVN reported in March, however, a similar ruling in Massachusetts by the state's Supreme Judicial Court resulted in swift action by the legislature to draft new legislation designed specifically to skirt the upskirt ruling. According to the Boston Globe at the time, "Under the bill signed Friday, it will now be a misdemeanor to take secret photos and videos of 'the sexual or other intimate parts of a person under or around the person’s clothing.' The law would apply to times when a 'reasonable person' would believe those parts of their body would not be publicly visible."   It remains to be seen if any other jurisdictions follow Massachusetts' lead, but if the wave of new "revenge porn" laws sweeping the states is any indication of the nation's mood regarding the posting of nonconsensual sexually oriented videos to websites, the creeps better get busy shooting before the hammer comes down and they are forced to actually get consent first. Additionally, one might also consider the possibility that such content triggers 18 USC 2257 record keeping requirements, which include "lascivious exhibition of the genitals." Considering the current crop of upskirts were posted to a porn-oriented tube site, one could easily assume they were both shot and posted with lascivious intent. In such a case, the poster to xHamster, if not the site itself, could be legally required to abide by 2257, which would of course be impossible if the subject was unaware they were being photographed in the first place.