Indecent exposure is considered to be an offense against public sensibilities. In this instance, it means that a person appears in a public place and exposes or does not clothe their private or intimate parts. For the purposes of this statute, “private or intimate parts” of a female person include the portion of the breast below the areola, meaning that a woman who is topless, or works in a place where the severs are topless would be in violation of this law, while a woman who is breastfeeding would not.
There are multiple sections of the New York penal law that discuss and are related to indecent exposure, and our team of experienced New York criminal attorneys are available to answer your questions if you or someone you know has been charged with this crime. It is important to know that a person does not have to be engaged in a lewd act while the exposure is taking place, it is only that their private or intimate parts are exposed, in such a way that they are viewable by the public. It is in this distinction that indecent exposure and public lewdness are separated. The use of the work public also broadens the scope of the applicability to the law. A public place can be used to define any place that is generally open to the public, meaning anything from a park, train or train station, library, or public restroom.
One of the defenses available to someone who has been charged with indecent exposure is that they were doing so in the process of being a part of show, play or some other type of entertainment. Gentleman’s clubs (or strip clubs) are one such exemption in the state of New York, but we are also well versed in handling charges related to such clubs. This also does not allow for any town, city or village within New York to adopt more comprehensive laws that deal with the same type of situation involved with indecent exposure, meaning that a person can be charged with indecent exposure in the state of New York, but also can result in charges from whichever town or city that the incident occurred in. For these reasons, as well as the possibility that these charges can result in a jail sentence, we recommend that you reach out to our experienced team of New York criminal attorneys now to make sure that the charges involved are handled in a way that obtains the best possible disposition for the accused.
Our office has handled multiple cases that either dealt with these specific charges, or ones even more serious and have been successful in making sure the complex legal issues involved were dealt with in a way that achieved the best possible outcome through communication between client and attorney and the attorney and the District Attorney. Call us now to discuss what options are available to you if you or someone you know has been charged with indecent exposure.