When actress Roseanne Barr capped her solo rendition of the Star Spangled Banner by grabbing her crotch before hundreds of San Diego Padres fans a decade ago, people gasped, booed and criticized her, but nobody charged her with a crime.
When a 16-year-old boy made the same gesture in front of one woman in Vernal, Uintah County, two years ago, he was judged guilty of lewdness, a class B misdemeanor.
But the Utah Court of Appeals ruled Thursday that grabbing your crotch is not against state law.
In a unanimous six-page decision, the court decided that while Utah's lewdness statute is not unconstitutionally vague, grabbing your crotch in front of other people is not an act "of equal magnitude of gravity" as those acts specifically mentioned in the law.
To violate the lewdness law, "conduct must rise to the level of sexual intercourse or sodomy, exposing (private parts), masturbating, or trespassory voyeurism," the opinion, written by Judge James Z. Davis, states.
Prosecutors had argued before 8th District Juvenile Court Judge Larry A. Steele that the boy's act amounted to masturbation, therefore violating specific language in the statute.
According to the ruling, on Sept. 26, 1998, the boy was standing on the sidewalk of a convenience store in front of a woman sitting inside a car when he grabbed his crotch and "shook it up and down." The gesture lasted between 10 and 15 seconds, then the boy laughed, pointed at the woman and rubbed his crotch, the opinion states.
An undercover police officer working at the convenience store observed the act, and a petition was filed in juvenile court charging the boy with lewdness, the ruling states.
In finding the boy guilty of the crime, Steele stated that he found "beyond a reasonable doubt that the conduct was intentional," but that it did not amount to masturbation, as prosecutors alleged.
Nevertheless, "I do find that that is inappropriate and offensive, and do find based on the language of the statute that it does violate the lewdness statute," Steele said.
"Gripping in public is rude and crude, but it isn't breaking the law," said defense attorney Alan Williams Friday.
The Court of Appeals agreed.
"Although (the boy's) gestures were certainly immature and offensive, they are not of similar gravity as the conduct expressly proscribed by" the law, the opinion states.
Assistant attorney general Karen Klucznik said the ruling has the potential of making it more difficult to press charges against "less obviously" lewd conduct. However, she said, Utah's lawmakers could fix that by amending the statute.
"I think that they could more specifically describe the conduct that they want to proscribe" in the statute, she said.
You can reach Hans Camporreales by e-mail at hans@desnews.com