A Japanese passenger who illegally filmed a female flight attendant's body on a flight bound for Hong Kong was sentenced to prison.
On Jan. 12, according to foreign media including the South China Morning Post (SCMP), a Hong Kong court sentenced a 46-year-old Japanese national, an information technology (IT) company employee identified as A, to four weeks in prison and a fine of 10,000 Hong Kong dollars (about 1.87 million won) on charges of filming under a female flight attendant's skirt on board.
A committed the crime on Nov. 24 last year on a flight that departed Japan and was transiting through Hong Kong. A sat in a window seat and pretended to be filming the view outside.
However, a male passenger seated behind A grew suspicious that the phone camera kept pointing at the flight attendant and alerted the crew.
When the crew moved to check, A hurriedly deleted one photo from the phone in an attempt to destroy evidence. But a check of the phone turned up five to six photos showing the backs of the attendants, and among them was a photo zoomed in under a flight attendant's skirt.
Police concluded, based on the shooting angles of the photos, that A carried out the act in a premeditated manner. The victims were a Korean flight attendant and a Taiwanese flight attendant, who were performing routine service duties on board when this occurred.
During the trial, A argued, "I was only trying to film the view outside the window before landing, and the photos that were taken were not what I intended."
A, who had continued to deny the charges, eventually admitted to them. In particular, A was said to have told police, "The way the flight attendants had their legs spread was beautiful."
The court ruled that because the photos repeatedly focused on the attendants' lower bodies and included an image zoomed in on a specific area, it was "a premeditated crime rather than an accident," and said, "Given the seriousness of illegal filming crimes and the psychological trauma to the victims, a prison sentence is unavoidable. Under no circumstances should flight attendants be treated as sexual objects," before imposing a prison term.