Odd, 'arguably unethical' argument to salvage 'improper photography' statute

Mark Bennett breaks down the state's odd argument before the Court of Criminal Appeals aiming to uphold the constitutionality of Texas' "improper photography" statute (see prior Grits coverage) in a fashion so narrow that it would no longer criminalize the defendant's conduct in the instant case. Says Bennett:

The State’s narrowing argument in Thompson’s case stinks. While the facts of the case are not legally relevant to the as-written challenge, if the State had interpreted Section 1.07(a)(11) as the prosecutor urged at the Court of Criminal Appeals, Mr. Thompson would never have been charged—the subjects of his photographs were in public. It’s disingenuous—arguably unethical—for the State to argue a theory of the law on appeal under which the State would never have charged the defendant in the first place. If the State had follow its proposed rule, the defendant would never have been charged, never had to go to the expense and trouble of hiring Don to defend him through three courts.

The Court of Criminal Appeals could adopt the State’s proposed narrowing of the law and find that the statute does not forbid taking photos of people’s exposed parts in public because people with parts exposed in public consent, as a matter of law, to those parts being photographed. (Part of Volokh’s argument was that this could save the statute from overbreadth, but might cause a vagueness problem.) If the Court of Criminal Appeals does this, Mr. Thompson wins. Bexar County loses, and could lose big—since, according to the State’s own logic, Mr. Thompson should never have been prosecuted, Bexar County might find itself writing him a large check after he files his Section 1983 suit.