FUKUSHIMA – Fukushima Prefectural Police said they arrested a 33-year-old man Thursday for allegedly scattering at a parking lot photos of his ex-girlfriend taken in the nude.
They said it is the first arrest under the law targeting “revenge porn,” enforced in November to punish distribution of personal sexual images with the intent of retaliation.
According to police, Shinya Miyata, a company employee of Sukagawa, Fukushima Prefecture, reportedly admitted he had scattered several pictures of his ex-girlfriend at a shopping mall parking lot in Koriyama, Fukushima, between Jan. 25 and 27. The woman in the photos, which Miyata reportedly said were taken when he was going out with her, was either naked or partly dressed.
The law was established amid increasing revenge porn cases, especially online, as it became easy for people to post private pictures on the Internet using social networking services. The law makes it a crime to disclose sexually explicit images or videos of former spouses or friends who can be identified to an unspecified number of people and subjects the offenders to up to three years in prison or a fine of up to ¥500,000.
Experts say there are limits to the law’s effect to recover damages, because once the images or videos were distributed on the Internet, it would be difficult to completely delete them.
In a time of both misinformation and too much information, quality journalism is more crucial than ever.
By subscribing, you can help us get the story right.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.