Ada Man Gets 3-10 Years for Camera in Changing Room

[XLFD]

Meanwhile, Ludington Officials Recorded People Changing in Bathroom for 3 + 10 Years,Praised Themselves, Hung Signs . 

If you are a civilian and hide cameras in rest rooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms, expect some harsh penalties.  Richard Schmeling is the latest voyeur who got caught in our area emulating Ludington City Government , but unlike our officials, they are paying consequences for it.  Schmeling set up a camera phone hidden in the upper part of a changing room and started recording, but he never got to view the product as it was detected before he could get back to it, nor did it catch anybody disrobed in its recording, but the intent was there, and now he could be out in-ten. 

Meanwhile, in Ludington, the public has exactly no idea what has happened with the thirteen years of bathroom recordings of the Waterfront Park, with hidden cameras in the ventilation over the stalls, and less hidden ones pointed at the stalls and urinals.  We do know that our City Manager will charge you $150 to view the recordings of one day after the police edit out any parts that may infringe on someone's privacy.  Whoa, pilgrim, that's already happened.

Our justice system applauds our City's vigilance in looking in on our young kids in various states of undress, while sentencing individuals up to ten years for doing a lot less.  Here is the story, with some links to the backstory. 

                             Richard "I wish I had immunity like Ludington Officials"  Schmeling

The man who admitted to using a camera-phone to peep into a dance studio changing room used by young girls wept and slammed his fist on a podium after learning of the harsh sentence handed down by a Kent County Circuit Court judge.

Judge Mark Trusock used his discretion on Thursday, Jan. 30, to stack two sentences against 28-year-old Richard Schmeling, who will spend three to 10 years in prison.

“What are we going to do?” Schmeling’s wife yelled out as friends and family tried to comfort her. “It’s not going to be alright.”

Trusock handed down the sentence after hearing from a mother of one of the young girls who in March attended Ada Dance Academy, 473 Pettis Ave. SE, where police discovered a phone hidden in a hole punched through drywall.

Related: Man allegedly put iPhone near Ada Dance dressing room, left fingerp...

“He wanted to videotape naked children,” said the mother, who came to court accompanied by staff and students of the academy. “This was a family man with a lot to lose but his urges were too strong.”

The mother said her daughter has suffered nightmares and anxiety and has had to seek therapy.

Schmeling was aware of the school because he was a construction worker there three years earlier.

He broke into the school and placed the phone where it recorded multiple victims changing their clothes into dance attire. Only the victims' tights under their clothing were visible, police said.

Investigators said the phone, which Verizon Wireless identified as Schmeling’s, was still recording when it was discovered.

Defense attorney Frank Stanley argued that his client already suffers tremendously as he now delivers pizza after losing his job and is losing his home because it is in a child safety zone where convicted sex offenders are not allowed.

Before his sentencing, a weeping Schmeling turned to face those from the academy and asked for forgiveness.

“I have a 5-month-old daughter and when I look into her pretty blue eyes I ask why would I have done something like that when I know I would be devastated if it happened to her,” Schmeling said.

Under state law, using a computer to commit a crime is an offense that can run either concurrently or consecutively with other crimes depending on the determination of the sentencing judge.

Trusock decided to have the 1-1/2 to five-year sentence for the computer offense run after Schmeling serves a 1-1/2 to five-year sentence for taking pictures of an unclothed person.

“I don’t know what you would have done with this video if you had gotten it,” Trusock said to Schmeling. “Children need to feel safe in places like this.”

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2014/01/3_to_10_ye...

[Willy]

What Schmeling did was wrong and he should be punished but receiving a sentence of up to 10 years is absurd. Then when you take Ludingtons complicity in doing the same thing but on a much larger scale makes 10 years seem really is absurd. And when you take into consideration that anyone can see kids almost nude at the beach makes the 10 years seem preposterous. I've seen females from children to teens to adults with swimming attire that leaves little or nothing to the imagination. Mr Schmeling could have seen more at the beach and could have video recorded females almost nude and been perfectly legal in doing so. What his crime was really about  was an invasion of privacy, something Ludington is guilty of on a daily basis at the public restrooms.

[XLFD]

He's got a bad enough sentence going through life with the name he has (Richard Schmeling --> 'Dick Smelling').  Something he may be doing for years.

Obviously, a double standard once again exists here between public servants 'keeping you safe' by sneaking cameras into your public bathroom and a private individual doing this for 'prurient research'.  Let us not forget, beneath every public employee there is a private individual, so if you really want to be able to do this kind of stuff without repercussions, get civically involved.

Either that, or he could have come out with gender-identity dysphoria, joined the dance school, and insisted on changing with the other girls. 

[XLFD]

Here, the police are recording themselves violating the privates of men and women stopped for traffic related offenses down in Atlanta.  Without reasonable suspicion/probable cause stated to the individual violated by the officers, this is as illegal as if you or I went up to someone detained them forcibly with a gun (and often friends) at our side, and started fondling them. 

These are law officers, they should be well aware of the law, and dealt with more severely than your common citizen would be, because not only are they engaging in criminal sexual conduct (2nd degree, up to 15 years), they are doing it against their sworn oath of office and against their sworn duties as police officers.  But, due to our evolving police state, they get a free pass to fondle and humiliate by their fellow officials violating their oaths, while arresting other citizens who are guilty of much less that get many years in the slammer.