indecent exposure

J. Bradley Smith of Arnold & Smith, PLLC answers the question “What is the difference between a misdemeanor and a felony?”

The law is catching up with drones. If you plan to operate a drone in the state of North Carolina, you need to know about some new laws the North Carolina General Assembly passed this summer. The provisions regarding drones were included in “The Current Operations and Capital Improvements Appropriations Act of 2014,” also known as Senate Bill 744.

Most of the new laws regarding drones go into effect on October 1 of this year. The laws add to North Carolina’s criminal code to establish, in effect, a class of “drone crimes.” Drones are called “unmanned aircraft” in the law, and are defined as “aircraft operated without the possibility of human intervention from within or on the aircraft.” The act excludes model aircraft from the act.

It will become illegal on October 1 to use drones to conduct surveillance of a person, an occupied dwelling or private real property without consent. Private real property means land that is owned by private individuals or companies. “Occupied dwelling” refers to any houses or buildings that have people in them. The act prohibits photographing people using a drone without their consent if the purpose for taking the photograph is to publish it or publically disseminate it.

Law enforcement officers may use drones in ways the act prohibits. The act carves out exceptions for officers who are using drones to counter a “high risk of terrorist attack.” Officers can also conduct drone surveillance of areas within their plain view from places they have a legal right to be. They can use drones in connection with serving a search warrants. They can use drones when they have “reasonable suspicion of specified imminent circumstances,” and they can use them to photograph gatherings to which the general public is invited.

J. Bradley Smith of Arnold & Smith, PLLC answers the question “What is the difference between a misdemeanor and a felony?”

Scott Wiener wants public nudity banned in San Francisco.

Mr. Wiener’s opponent in a race for a spot on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors is George Davis. Mr. Davis believes that nudity is free speech protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Yesterday he went to Times Square and stripped naked, then gave interviews in the nude while “onlookers gawked, laughed and took photos” and one man “loudly read Bible passages.”

Times Square is in Manhattan, a borough of New York City, which is 2,908 miles away from San Francisco. Mr. Davis could just as easily have come to Charlotte to strip, but if he had, he would have been arrested and he probably would not have garnered as much publicity.

Stripping naked in North Carolina would have subjected Mr. Davis to criminal penalties under state law. It is a misdemeanor for anyone to willfully expose his or her “private parts” in a public place “and in the presence of any other person or persons.” It is a felony if the exposure is made to arouse or gratify sexual desire.

State law does not define what “private parts” are, but North Carolina courts have provided an answer. In 1995, Mark Edward Fly pulled his shorts down to his ankles and bent over, exposing the “crack of his buttocks” and his “fanny” to Barbara Glover on the landing outside her condominium. He was convicted of indecent exposure, but the state Court of Appeals reversed his conviction, ruling that “private parts” means “genital organs.” Genital organs, the court observed, are those organs related to “biological reproduction.”

Articles Tagged with indecent exposure

North Carolina legislature moves to regulate drones

Wiener’s ban on nudity drives opponent to nude show on opposite coast