Cooper v. State (2010)

In Cooper v. State, 326 S.W.3d 757 (Tex. App.--Texarkana 2010, pet. granted and ref'd*), Cooper was convicted of creating an improper visual recording of women as they walked down the sidewalk. See Cooper, 326 S.W.3d at 758-59. No one testified at trial that they saw Cooper record the videos, but two witnesses testified that they identified him on the videos themselves. Id. at 760-61. The court of appeals reviewed the videos and did not see any part of the videographer's body. Id. at 762. The court also considered the circumstantial evidence that Cooper was the videographer, but it rejected the legal sufficiency of that evidence, explaining: "Ownership of the camera proves ownership. Without more, it cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the camera was used at a particular time by a particular person. There is no evidence that Cooper had sole possession of the location from which the videos were made. The evidence shows to the contrary. The uncontroverted evidence shows that at least several other people had access to both locations over an extended period of time." Id. at 762-63. The court concluded that a rational jury could not find beyond a reasonable doubt from this evidence that Cooper recorded the videos, and it reversed the conviction. Id. at 763.