Caught on Camera

Recently a pervert was caught on a Florida Target store surveillance camera trying to film up a woman’s skirt.

As of this posting, police are still looking for him.

“Peeping Toms” always concern me because such a crime is often a stepping stone to something much worse. John Douglas and Mark Olshaker’s excellent book Mindhunter lays out this sort of criminal escalation in a very detailed manner.

Let’s talk countermeasures.

• Trust your instincts.
  • If someone gives you a bad feeling, move away from them.
• Be wary of a person’s movement that correlates to your own movement (“Being followed”)
  • Notice how the perpetrator keeps following the girl?
  • Keep moving if you think someone is following you and report it to store security.
• Look down at the bottom of the shopping cart.
  • Whether it is a shoplifter or a pervert, hiding something on the bottom of a shopping cart is one of the oldest tricks in the book but it still works a lot of the time.
• Be wary of someone who seems to be wandering around the store with no real purpose.
• The furtive glances around also give him away.

  Target HQ (Photo credit: smcgee)

• Turn the tables!
  • Use your own smartphone camera (with sound and flash turned off if you want to avoid a direct confrontation) to get a picture of the guy.