Oregon man will not be jailed for 'appalling' upskirt cell phone photo of 13-year-old girl

A 61-year-old Oregon man was acquitted after a judge ruled that he did not break the law when he took a picture up a 13-year-old girl's skirt inside a department store, The Oregonian reported.

Judge Eric Butterfield said on Thursday that while Patrick Buono's actions were "lewd" and "appalling," that from a legal standpoint, "he didn't do anything wrong."

Buono had been charged with two counts of attempted second-degree encouraging child sex abuse and two counts of invasion of privacy for sticking his cell phone camera under the girl's skirt last January and taking a picture. Buono never disputed his actions.

His attorney, Mark Lawrence, argued that the law specifically covers photos taken in places where people have an expectation of privacy, such as locker rooms, restrooms, dressing rooms, and tanning booths. By contrast, his client approached the girl in a public area. He also said the girl was not naked at the time of the incident, since she was wearing underwear.

"These things are not only seen but video-recorded," Lawrence said. "It's incumbent on us as citizens to cover up whatever we don't want filmed in public places."

"Sure, she's in a public place," Washington County prosecutor Paul Maloney said in his counter-argument. "But she had an expectation of privacy that a deviant isn't going to stick a camera up her skirt and capture private images of her body."

KGW-TV reported that Butterfield acquitted Buono despite finding that he took the illicit picture for the purpose of "arousing and satisfying his sexual desires."

The girl's father, William Hergenhan, ripped the verdict.

"Well, if you think from a practical sense some man like that can go take a picture under this little girl's skirt, I mean, any parent would say that's not right," Hergenhan told KGW. "Something needs to change."