R v George
Citations: [1956] Crim LR 52.
Facts
The defendant was charged with indecent assault after he was caught trying to take shoes off the feet of young girls. He admitted that he had a foot fetish and did this for sexual gratification.
Issue(s)
- Did the defendant’s indecent motive make his actions indecent?
Decision
The jury found the defendant not guilty, having determined that the act was not indecent.
This Case is Authority For…
This case appears to indicate that sexual motives alone does not necessarily make an act indecent.
Other
It is unclear whether this case would be decided the same way today. This is because an act is ‘sexual‘ for the purposes of the new sexual assault offence if ‘because of its nature it may be sexual and because of its circumstances or the purpose of any person in relation to it (or both) it is sexual’.
It is possible that a modern jury would decide that removing shoes cannot ever be sexual, and so cannot be made sexual by the defendant’s purposes. However, given contemporary sensibilities, it is difficult to imagine a jury being unwilling to contemplate that most things could in theory be sexual.
