Solicitor acquitted of
voyeurism back in court
Thursday, June 05, 2008
THE BELEFAST TELEGRAPH
A solicitor cleared of voyeurism after admitting to filming a woman in a changing area said he would be “raging” if anyone took footage of his girlfriend, judges heard yesterday.
Richie MacRitchie (32) was acquitted despite accepting that he used his mobile phone to record four clips of her wearing a bikini in a cubicle at a west Belfast leisure centre.
Lawyers challenging the decision of Resident Magistrate Fiona Bagnall to dismiss the charge said the woman claimed a fifth attempt was made to film her after she changed into underpants.
Mr MacRitchie, who practices in Belfast and lives at Ardmullan, Omeath, Co Louth, denied recording a private act for sexual gratification.
The allegation against him centred on an incident in October 2006 when the woman told staff at the mixed changing area she saw a man holding a mobile phone under her cubicle.
Although Mrs Bagnall said she was satisfied the prosecution had made a case that the images were recorded for sexual gratification, she held that the woman was not engaged in a private act according to the Sexual Offences Act.
Her ruling last October was based on an acceptance that the woman was wearing a bikini at the time she was filmed.
Contesting that decision before the Court of Appeal, Gerald Simpson QC, for the prosecution, said recordings were made four times without the woman’s knowledge.
“There was then apparently a fifth occasion when she had changed into her pants when she saw the camera,” Mr Simpson said.
Parts of the woman’s statement were read out:
“I reached down for my socks, and as I reached down I saw a person holding a black Samsung-style of mobile phone. The phone and his hand were inside my cubicle.”
During police interviews Mr MacRitchie said he made two or three recordings, each for “only a couple of seconds”.
He said he didn’t know why it had happened, adding:
“I wasn’t thinking clearly at all, I just stuck it under.”
Mr MacRitchie accepted it was a foolish act and stressed he was in a relationship.
“Of course if it was my fiancee or my wee girl I would be raging,” he said during an interview.
Judgment was reserved in the case, which was heard by a panel headed by Lord Chief Justice Sir Brian Kerr.
