OPINION
Appellant challenges his seven convictions of gross-misdemeanor interference with privacy for surreptitiously videotaping seven women in a locker room shower area, arguing that the district сourt erred in interpreting Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(d) (2006), to permit seven convictions because only one conviction for the unlawful act of installing the video camera was warranted. We affirm.
On December 27, 2007, appеllant Steven James Sopko, a janitor, installed a video camera in an air vent in a women’s college locker room, adjusted it to face the shower area, and left it recording. Later thаt day, the video camera was detected and retrieved by members of an athletic team and turned over to police. The video camera captured appellant’s image as he installed the camera and adjusted the vent. Appellant admitted to officers that he installed the video camera in the vent. Appellant never viewed the videotape. 1 Appellant was сharged with seven counts of interference with privacy, in violation of Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(d), because the video camera captured the images of seven women in the shower area, six of whom were entirеly unclothed.
A stipulated-facts trial was held. The district court found that the shower area is a place where a reasonable person expects privacy and constitutes a locatiоn where a person would likely expose his or her intimate parts. The court also found, beyond a reasonable doubt, that appellant installed the video camera with the intent to intrude upon thе privacy of those inside the shower area. The court found appellant guilty of seven counts of interference with privacy. Appellant was sentenced to 365 days in jail with 315 stayed for two years on count one, and consecutive sentences of 180 days in jail with 130 stayed for two years on each of the remaining counts. This appeal follows.
ISSUE
Did the district court properly construe Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(d), to permit a conviction for each victim?
ANALYSIS
Appellant argues that the district court erred in determining that he was appropriately charged with seven counts of interference with privacy because the video camera appellant installed in the shower area captured the images of seven women. He contends that he should have been charged with only one count becausе the statute penalizes the single act of installing the video camera. Whether a statute has been properly construed is a question of law, subject to de novo review.
State v. Murphy,
The primary objective in interpreting a statute is “to give effect to the intention of the legislature in drafting the stаtute.”
State v. Thompson,
Under Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(d),
A person is guilty of a gross misdemeanor who:
(1) surreptitiously installs or uses any device for observing, photographing, recording, amplifying, or broadcasting sounds or events through the window or other aperturе of a sleeping room in a hotel, as defined in section 327.70, subdivision 3, a tanning booth, or other place where a reasonable person would have an expectation of privacy and has exposed or is likely to expose their intimate parts, as defined in section 609.341, subdivision 5, or the clothing covering the immediate area of the intimate parts; and
(2) does so with intent to intrude upon or interfеre with the privacy of the occupant.
Appellant argues that the statute’s plain meaning indicates that it was designed to criminalize the installation of the recording device and that the legislature intended that no image even need be captured. The state argues that appellant’s interpretation is too narrow and that the aim of the statute is to protect the privacy of persons from surreptitious invasion in a place where an individual would have a reasonable expectation of privacy.
This statute, as it pertains to multiple victims, has yet to be interpreted by Minnesоta courts. The statute was addressed in
State v. Morris,
in which the appellant argued that the evidence was insufficient to prove that he violated the statute by carrying a bag with a concealed video camera into a store and surreptitiously positioning the lens underneath a woman’s skirt.
The district court here relied on a case from the Alaska Court of Appeals with a similar fact pattern. In
Knutsen v. State,
the appellant challenged eight counts of indecent photography, based on his surreptitious installation of a video camera in a women’s dressing room at a pool where he worked as a lifeguard.
Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(d), provides that a person is guilty of interference with privacy when he “installs or uses” a recording device in a place where a person
The occasion and necessity for the law is not mеrely to prevent an individual from installing a recording device, but to protect an individual’s privacy in a place where there is an expectation of privacy. The mischief to be remedied is nоt merely the installation of a recording device, but to prevent invasion or interference into one’s privacy. The object to be obtained is not merely to prevent the installation of a rеcording device, but to prevent one’s intrusion into another’s privacy. Finally, the consequences of interpreting the statute in the manner suggested by appellant would minimize the conduct of an individual who interferes with the privacy of multiple victims. It should not matter whether appellant installed the camera one time and recorded seven women or if he installed the camera seven times and recorded seven women. Because the aim of the statute is to protect an individual’s privacy, the district court did not err in construing the statute to permit multiple convictions because appellаnt violated the privacy of seven individuals.
We recognize that MinmStat. § 609.04 (2006) prevents multiple convictions based on the same conduct in some situations. But Minnesota makes an exception for a single-behavioral incident when there are multiple victims.
Bangert v. State,
DECISION
Because a criminal defendant charged with interference with the privacy of multiple individuals, in violation of Minn.Stat. § 609.746, subd. 1(d), can lawfully be charged and sentenced for a separate offense for еach victim, the district court did not err in finding appellant guilty on seven counts and sentencing him to seven consecutive sentences.
Affirmed.
Notes
. This court finds it troublesome that although appellant never viewed the tape, the victims have been subject to countless replays of the video production as this matter has made its way through our justice system.