Man caught filming showering woman claimed he was checking how waterproof his phone was

A Peeping Tom used his mobile phone to film a woman showering in a swimming pool cubicle, then claimed he was only trying to see if the phone was waterproof. Zak Hardy told police that he took his new phone into his cubicle to test how water proof it was by placing it under his shower. The 18-year-old claimed as he was drying the phone he activated the camera accidentally.

At Exeter magistrates court his solicitor Nick Bradley said Hardy now accepted that his account, made when he was not represented, was not true as he had held the phone above his head and over into the next cubicle. Hardy, of Plymouth, Devon, admitted voyeurism by recording a private act in June at the Riverside swimming pool in Exeter, Devon. Prosecutor Ian Graham said the naked woman in the shower cubicle saw a light coming overhead from a blue phone.



He said the woman grabbed a towel and covered herself and left the cubicle to raise the alarm with staff. Mr Graham said Hardy was seen darting into another changing cubicle and staff waited for him to come out – holding his phone. In police interview he said: "He explained how he took his new mobile phone into the cubicle to see how waterproof it was. He said he then shook it to dry it off of any water residue.

"But he claimed he did not lock it and it was on a text message screen and he activated the camera and while drying it 'it may have accidentally captured images of her showering in that cubicle' – that was his account." Mr Bradley said he had a ‘robust’ discussion with Hardy over his police account and said: "He accepts what he did. It is not the most serious offence although it was of course upsetting for the complainant." Hardy was given an 18 month community order with supervision, pay £150 compensation, had his phone destroyed and given a five year sexual offences banning order and be on the sex offenders’ register for five years.