Foot lose: Idiot perv's shoe-mounted upskirt vid camera explodes A pervert in Wisconsin, USA, surrendered himself to the cops after a plan to secretly take photos under women's skirts blew up in his face, er, ankle. The unnamed creep hobbled into the Madison West District police station earlier this week complaining of a foot injury, and seeking to turn himself in. It turns out the bloke's …
I'd consider paying for a full amputation at the neck... [juuust kidding]
seriously, though, this kind of blatant stupidity should NEVER be paid for by "everybody else". Know-what-I-mean?
Not only that, but pretty much everybody knows that shorting out a LiPo battery can make it burst into flames. His tech skills are obviously not worth much. I dunno why he'd use a LiPo anyway, considering that throwaway batteries would last longer. Ah, well, pervs aren't very smart to begin with.
The subject reported he had purchased a shoe camera
I'm really struggling to conceive of a legitimate use case for such a device. Of course banning them won't stop pitiful creeps trying to build their own, but the comedy potential when the homebrew equivalents blow up could be pretty good, and there'd obviously be fewer attempts.
I stopped to think of a legitimate use and thought of a TV promo spot featuring a football being kicked from the point of view of a boot - but nah, one would just use a GoPro or similar for that.
Reducing the number of upskirt photos is the reason many camera phones make a fake shutter noise that can't be disabled by the user.
Wouldn't they just use the video recording instead. Would probably mean they would get the shot they want with 4k video being normal these days on phone cameras and also 60FPS+ on some, would think they would get more 'gratification' from that, making the fake noise pointless these days. When they were first introduced probably not as video recording was poor back then.
"I'm really struggling to conceive of a legitimate use case for such a device."
I'm a skydiver. Often skydivers attach cameras (such as GoPros) to their feet to take certain angled shots, such as during canopy piloting or wingsuiting. Presumably other "action" sports may do similar.
With all of the vast quantity of pix of girls of various ages in various stages of undress which abound on the Internet for _free_, this moron (apologies to actual morons) tries to take pix himself... and blows himself up? For those who really want those kinds of pix, a simple search for 'upskirt pix' or similar will reveal (yes, I said it...) much. (Do that search on someone else's machine. I did. You wouldn't believe just how many pervs there are out there...) Certain Hollywierd movies, and not just 'Basic Instinct', either, are notorious for having upskirt shots, as are certain 'celebs'. Including one near and dear to the hearts of Reg commentards. And yet he felt the need to take his own pix. Damn, but he's an idiot. Squared and cubed.
The goal was not to take pictures but to get away with doing something naughty. Demonstrating a level of stupidity sufficient to enter politics, the twit failed to get away with it by firstly confessing to a clergyman (mentioned in an article elsewhere) and then following the clergyman's advice by talking to the police.
Let me preface this by saying that I don't condone such behavio(u)r ... However, would you take a picture of El Capitan and/or Half Dome and/or Bridal Veil Falls if you visited Yosemite? Why bother, when there are so many pictures of them freely available online?
Yes, he's an idiot. And stupidity should hurt. But as a photographer, I can understand the draw to take his own pics. Shame he didn't singe himself a trifle higher up.
"And yet he felt the need to take his own pix."
There are certain mindsets that some people have where they want to be with the "in crowd". Some are "collectors" who just want everything they can get, even though they may never use most of it, eg people who who have libraries of millions of MP3s or films/TV shows they;ll never have time to watch or listen to. Then there's those who feel the need to "give back" to the groups they collected from and then get competitive and not only need to "give back" but to become number one in the group.
In the case of sexual gratification, there are some who wank off to fairly innocuous porm/perv stuff but gradually increase the level of perviness until they can no longer wank off to the innocuous stuff they started with. I suppose it's what might be termed an addictive personality.
I don't believe its all about the pictures, but the act of doing it. The thrill of getting picture of someone that doesn't know and then getting away with it.
The problem is if it is that which he was seeking then I would think the thrill would wear off after getting away with it a few times and then he would try going to the next level. What that is I don't know, toilet cams. peeping into people bed rooms at night, then what??
If only there was a law banning morons.
That was tried, only some morons decided it wasn't in their best interest
Indeed. It would have been a lot less embarrassing. He could have told them he was going to stick the camera up his arse but accidentally dropped it on his foot first, causing it to explode. The ER doc would have just shrugged and thought, "Not another one!"
I'm guessing he thought he had some legitimate complaint that he'd been ripped off and/or injured by the guy who had sold him the camera, was expecting the cops to take a greater interest in that than what he had bought it for.
I could have told him it wouldn't end well. When I strapped my Panasonic M1 VHS camcorder to my foot all I got was torn ligaments. But at least the sealed lead acid batteries didn't explode. Proper technology that; not dangerous magic moonbeams compacted in a foil wrapper.
"Why else would he confess his attempted crime to the police? He could just as well have gone to an E.R. and make something up about his injuries."
Maybe he hadn't the wit to invent a good story (having his foot explode might have rattled what wits he had), reckoned ER would call the police anyway and found the cop shop was closer so he might as well settle for a short hobble and a longer ride.
According to Ars Technica's report of the same story:
“When the explosion happened, he got treatment for minor burns, then disclosed what happened to his mentor, a clergyman,” Madison police officer David Dexheimer told the Wisconsin State Journal. The clergyman told him to visit the police.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/06/mans-creepy-upskirting-plan-foiled-when-his-shoe-camera-explodes/
"
.. couldn't think of a plausible innocent reason for having a camera mounted in his shoe in the first place
"
He would obviously have removed the shoe + camera before visiting ER, and there's all manner of stories that would explain something catching fire close to his foot. Like dropping a Samsung onto it, for example ...
In America health care is only available to the rich and incarcerated
In NHS UK, the Mental Health budgets are always seemingly close to the red.
Unless you can pay for it or have had it ordered by court, good luck getting it apart from some volunteer group run courses.
... was this staged to provoke a media reaction to allow ever more restrictive legislation on photography in public places? Along "think of the children" lines, think of those unfortunate persons who choose to wear non-concealing clothing being photographed. Rather than dress appropriately, their right to wear non-concealing clothing while expecting unwarranted privacy must take precedence over our freedom to take photographs in public.
How do you legislate what camera angle is illegal? Is there an equation based on the relative size of the clothing to the wearer? What if your camera is not concealed so it's obvious you are taking photos? What about overhead camera angles that reveal more of the upper body? What precise areas of the body are deemed "private"? Can an underdressed person cause a photographer to commit an offence, if the same photo would have been OK on someone properly dressed?
Without well-defined rights to photography in public, It's a slippery slope.
No the trick is to keep it vague: That way you can prosecute a photographer at a protest march or ban an image of a politician caught in-the-arms-of-a-damsel. And of course you need to make it an offence not to turn over all any phone or camera to the police to investigate.
There is a funny talk by a law prof (LSE?) about whether lady Godiver should be prosecuted for public indecency or Peeping Tom for peeping.
And in order to tell whether it was "for salacious purposes", obviously you'd have to peep. To see if she's riding the pommel suggestively, or has tassels on her... extremities.
So that's Tom off the hook too. He was just doing his civic duty, however unpleasant.
Look ma I’m a professional cameraman...
It takes a lot of footwork to survive in this business. The instructions said to just put your best foot forward. If it fails explosively try the other foot.
If you need to hot-foot-it just go to the nearest police station. They'll understand... they have their own body cams, and are the primary consumers of your work.
While you’re there fill out an application. FYI: Spying on people’s online activity pays better, and has less personal risk.
The police blotter states "Investigation continuing." Here's hoping it lead to criminal charges, if only to make it (and his name) a matter of public record.
After all, he did confess to criminal attempt to commit voyeurism. And if he was stupid enough to talk about it with some of his idiot friends, they all could face conspiracy to commit voyeurism charges.
And there i was, thinking these upskirt videos were the result of dedicated people with hand held cameras falling down onto the ground wherever a skirt appeared...and not pervs. Never mind, i'll be walking about for a week looking at everyone's shoes now, thinking to myself, "if i see smoke, i'll shout gotcha!"
Other than on something like standing room only public transport e.g. train, tube, bus, tram at peak times, how would some dodgy perv get his foot in position for shots without it being really obvious he was up to no good?
.. Though given the amount of time I unfortunately spend on sardine special trains (where actually having a seat is just a fantasy) I suppose perv has lots of chances for his dubious activities.
I assume the whole risk of getting caught / it involving "real people" (as opposed to pr0n actors) must be a major motivator - as others have said, plenty of imagery / vids on the web so most people could find whatever their particular fave peccadillo was. The Daily Fail sidebar of shame would (by all accounts) have kept him happy*
* I have no desire to give Mail any ad revenue so do not visit links to it, but its sidebar of shame and hypocrisy (upskirt pics whilst articles are full of censorious guff) is legendary (in my case I read about the sidebar in Private Eye as the Mail double standards are frequently highlighted there)
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