A New Jersey man convicted in connection with watching porn videos while parked outside a fast-food restaurant appealed his case to a higher court — and lost.
The state appellate court Tuesday upheld the 2017 conviction of David J. Lomanto on obscenity and obstruction charges.
"Watching pornography in public serves no legitimate purpose," the Oct. 15 ruling states. "Doing so with one's windows down, and at a restaurant's busy parking lot in full view of families, recklessly exposed pornography to young children which, under the circumstances, was a hazardous condition."
Lomanto, 53, of Egg Harbor Township, was arrested April 22, 2014, after a woman saw him watching porn on an iPad on his steering wheel while his driver's side window was lowered in a fast-food restaurant's parking lot. The restaurant is not named in the court documents.
The woman, whose 12-year-old son had gone into the restaurant, said she could see "porn going on the video" and "heard moaning on the video." The woman said she was "shocked" as they lived in "a small town" and she never experienced anything like that in her life, the documents state.
After leaving the parking lot with her son, who, according to court documents, did not see or hear any porn, the woman detailed what she witnessed to a friend who contacted police.
When officers arrived at 8:21 p.m., approximately two hours after the woman was at the parking lot with her son, Lomanto was still parked at the location with his car's windows all the way down, according to court documents. An attorney for Lomanto did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday.
Lomanto initially refused to leave his car, then repeatedly refused to show the officer his license or other identification, authorities said.
A police computer forensics expert later obtained a search warrant for Lomanto’s iPad and found that he had been watching porn from 6:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. on April 22, 2014, and had used the restaurant’s Wi-Fi to stream the content, court records state.
Lomanto was charged in April 2015 with one count each of obstruction and public communication of obscenity. He was convicted in May 2017 and sentenced to two concurrent one-year terms of probation and five days in jail, which he has served.
In appealing his conviction, Lomanto claimed — among other things — that the definition of "publicly communicates" in the obscenity law is overly broad and that watching porn in the privacy of his car is protected under the U.S. Constitution. The state appellate court disagreed.
"While our courts have repeatedly acknowledged an individual's privacy interest in the contents of their automobile, we have never extended the zone of privacy to what occurs inside a car that is in plain view," the Oct. 15 ruling stated.
