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PostPosted: 12/21/09 2:42 pm • # 1 
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How strange is THIS? ~ Image ~ Sooz


Man convicted of in-home nudity

Published: Dec. 21, 2009 at 7:38 PM

FAIRFAX, Va., Dec. 21 (UPI) -- A Virginia man convicted of indecent exposure for being nude in his home said he filed an immediate appeal.

Erick Williamson, 29, was found guilty Friday in Fairfax General District Court and Judge Ian O'Flaherty sentenced him to 180 days in jail, suspended for one year, and court costs of $72, which he is not required to pay due to his appeal, The Washington Post reported Monday.

Williamson said he does not believe he did anything wrong when he was naked inside his home in the morning of Oct. 19. He said he did not intentionally expose himself to two women and a 7-year-old boy who passed by his home.

"That's outrageous," Williamson said of the verdict. "It's unbelievable."

A misdemeanor appeals court jury is scheduled to hear the case in February.

http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2009/12/21/ ... 261442319/


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 3:14 pm • # 2 
Maybe the two women and 7-year-old boy should be charged with being peeping toms... what were they doing looking into his home?


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 3:23 pm • # 3 
The women said he was standing in front of a picture window and in a doorway to his home, so it doesn;t sound like they were snooping arounf his house.

Man guilty of in-home indecent exposure
2 women say they saw him naked from windows of his Virginia home
The Associated Press
updated 3:20 p.m. PT, Fri., Dec . 18, 2009

FAIRFAX, Va. - As Erick Williamson sees it, being naked is liberating, and if passers-by get an eyeful while he's standing in front of a picture window, that's not his problem.

A Fairfax County judge saw it a little differently Friday, convicting Williamson of indecent exposure in a case that has raised questions about what's OK when you're in your own home.

Two women said they saw much more of Williamson than they cared to in October, even though he never left the confines of his home. He received neither jail time nor a fine but is appealing anyway, saying a larger principle is at stake.

"I think that being tried and found guilty of something like this is outrageous," Williamson said after he was convicted and sentenced. "I feel like I'm living in a fishbowl."

Williamson testified that he never intended to expose himself and was simply exercising "personal freedom" as he spent several hours naked in his Springfield home packing up belongings.

Police, prosecutors and two witnesses, though, said Williamson's actions were designed to draw attention to himself.

The first woman, school librarian Joyce Giuliani, said she heard some loud singing as she left her home and drove to work. As she drove by Williamson's home, she saw him naked, standing directly behind a large picture window.

'Eye contact'
A few hours later, Yvette Dean was walking her 7-year-old son to school along a trail that runs by Williamson's home.

She heard a loud rattle, looked to her left and saw Williamson standing naked, full frontal, in a side doorway.

"He gave me eye contact," Dean said, but otherwise made no gestures toward her or her son.

As she turned the corner, she looked back at the home, in disbelief at what she had just seen. Again, she saw Williamson, naked in the same picture window.

One of Williamson's housemates testified that Williamson had been nude well before dawn. Timothy Baclit testified that he woke up around 5 a.m. to go to work and found saw Williamson walking around "naked ... with a hard hat."

He said he warned Williamson that he would be visible to passers-by but that Williamson did not respond.

Williamson, 29, said the conversation with Baclit never occurred and that he never noticed that two women had seen him. He said "it did not occur to me" that people outside the home might see him naked.

'No one deserves to see it'
Regardless of whether he was seen, Williamson's conduct does not constitute indecent exposure, said his attorney, Dickson Young.

Under Virginia law, the charge requires "an obscene display or exposure" and must occur in "a public place or a place where others are present."

Young argued that neither prong had been met.

"Mere nudity is insufficient to declare conduct obscene," Young said, noting that none of the women testified that Williamson was aroused or that he made any sort of obscene gesture. "Nudity in one's own home is not a crime."

Fairfax County Prosecutor Marc Birnbaum said the witness testimony shows that he intended to expose himself to the women by making himself visible for extended periods of time and drawing attention to himself by making rattling noises and singing.

"No one deserves to see it, certainly not a young child," Birnbaum said.

Birnbaum sought jail time for Williamson, but General District Judge Ian M. O'Flaherty imposed only a suspended sentence, meaning that Williamson will serve no jail time if he keeps out of trouble.

If Williamson follows through on his plans to appeal, though, a circuit court judge could impose a stiffer punishment, technically up to a year in jail.

Williamson's Oct. 24 arrest received national attention and spurred debate about the boundaries of acceptable nudity.

Debate rages on
Kent Willis, director of the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said there is no line that defines what is acceptable in these types of cases.

"How you define public and private space depends on the behavior that's taking place," Willis said. He said that if the case is pursued through appellate courts, it could potentially provide more clarity on what constitutes indecent exposure in Virginia.

Williamson, a commercial diver who has since moved out of Fairfax County, said he was shocked by the verdict. He suggested after the hearing that he was the victim of a double standard.

"If I was looking in her window, I think we'd be having a whole different conversation," he said.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34483145/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/



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PostPosted: 12/21/09 3:50 pm • # 4 
He made a noise that got their attention so they weren't even delberately staring at windows and doors at first. He was singing loudly which would also draw attention. If he hadn't done those things to draw attention, I'd say forget about it. It's an automatic reaction to turn towards a noise (to try to see who's singing loudly, too, imo). I think if you live in a neighborhood, things should be considered, like people walking past, especially if it's kids.


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 4:19 pm • # 5 
I don't know for sure, of course, but I suspect he's a tad off-kilter.


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 4:27 pm • # 6 
One of Williamson's housemates testified that Williamson had been nude well before dawn. Timothy Baclit testified that he woke up around 5 a.m. to go to work and found saw Williamson walking around "naked ... with a hard hat."

Wonders if it was only his hat.


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 5:16 pm • # 7 
Lol, Ilenar. Or, maybe, where was he wearing the hard hat?


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 5:27 pm • # 8 
you pervs.....Image


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 5:55 pm • # 9 
Showing his shortcomings like that.........he should be ashamed. Image




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PostPosted: 12/21/09 6:16 pm • # 10 
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Off Kilter! Good one! Nver knew the derivation of that term until now, gop. Thanks.


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PostPosted: 12/21/09 6:56 pm • # 11 
Katy51 wrote:
Lol, Ilenar. Or, maybe, where was he wearing the hard hat?
Katy I dread to think


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PostPosted: 12/22/09 2:44 am • # 12 
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Why is nudity considered so "perverted" in the first place?

That two grown women are totally freaked out by the momentary sight of a nude man is pathetic. And why is it assumed that a 7 year old boy who catches a glimpse of a nude adult ( without an erection or anything sexual being implied) is somehow traumatized? ( And his mother has certainly seen a penis before!) Who decided that if you're nude in your own home, you can't sing, make any noise, or go near a window?


180 days in jail for this??? Americans are so uptight!


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PostPosted: 12/22/09 3:27 am • # 13 
Chaos, I'm with you on this one. Americans are such prudes.


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PostPosted: 12/22/09 3:45 am • # 14 
Chaos333 wrote:
Why is nudity considered so "perverted" in the first place?

That two grown women are totally freaked out by the momentary sight of a nude man is pathetic. And why is it assumed that a 7 year old boy who catches a glimpse of a nude adult ( without an erection or anything sexual being implied) is somehow traumatized? ( And his mother has certainly seen a penis before!) Who decided that if you're nude in your own home, you can't sing, make any noise, or go near a window?


180 days in jail for this??? Americans are so uptight!


Would it have been OK with you if he were wandering around in a park or his front yard, nude, drawing attention to himself?

It's a fine line here because you're talking about what someone is doing in their own home, but there's certainly a case that can be made that he was using the cover of being in his home to engage in lewd behavior that would have resulted in his arrest had he done it on his front lawn.


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PostPosted: 12/22/09 4:13 am • # 15 
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He wasn't in a park or his front yard, Gop. He was in his own home. Personally, I don't care about nudity. It's a natural state of being. We aren't talking about a guy running around in a public park with an erection, flashing school kids and making lewd comments.

What harm was done to those folks who caught a glimpse of a flaccid penis? Who is more harmful, a guy puttering around his house in the buff, or the fully clothed molestor/rapist?

I just disagree with this notion that to *see* a nude human being makes them "indecent". Other cultures are quite comfortable with nudity, why are we so different? We hassle breast-feeding mothers. A 2 second glimpse of a nipple during the Super Bowl causes an uproar. Good grief, we've had supposedly mature elected officials feel the need to cover *statues* with marble-not flesh- breasts.

This idea that the human body is something "dirty and shameful" is just silly, IMO.



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PostPosted: 12/22/09 4:51 am • # 16 
Chaos333 wrote:
Why is nudity considered so "perverted" in the first place?

That two grown women are totally freaked out by the momentary sight of a nude man is pathetic. And why is it assumed that a 7 year old boy who catches a glimpse of a nude adult ( without an erection or anything sexual being implied) is somehow traumatized? ( And his mother has certainly seen a penis before!) Who decided that if you're nude in your own home, you can't sing, make any noise, or go near a window?


180 days in jail for this??? Americans are so uptight!
I would think the only way a kid would be traumatized is if his mother over-reacted instead of just ignoring the guy. Unfortunately, I have to agree, we Americans are a bunch of prudes.


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PostPosted: 12/22/09 5:03 am • # 17 
I agree, pickles, that it's the mom's overreaction that was more likely to traumatize the kid. The first time I heard the story, there was nothing in it about him making noise to draw attention (Why do I wonder if that has been added later rather than really being part of what actually happened. Was the window open? How else would she hear his singing?) BUT, if she was SOOOOOO traumatized seeing him naked in his window, why oh why did the dingbat walk past his house AGAIN, and LOOK again when she heard a noise later in the day? Perhaps she should have walked a block over, or the other side of the street, or turned her attention to staring at the cracks in the pavement as she walked past? If he was making NO lewd gestures toward her, good grief, it's JUST a naked man. Truly, they aren't much to look at. SHE should be embarrassed for looking in his windows. I've never been able to see much through a window during daylight, so she had to take a really good look, don't you think? They were talking about daytime, not night when you almost can't help but see into people's houses if they don't have curtains drawn, because it's bright in the house and dark outside. She's the one who should be embarrassed for peeping into windows if she got a glimpse of something she didn't want to see.


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