High court upholds open and gross lewdness law

By Globe Staff

The state’s highest court has rejected a challenge to the state’s open and gross lewdness law that was brought by attorneys for a woman who was charged with the crime for dancing nude in a protest in Harvard Square.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that the law is a “legitimate content neutral restriction on expressive activity.”

The woman was arrested during an anti-Christmas protest, which takes place every year on June 25. A District Court Judge allowed her motion to dismiss the case after finding that the state’s open and gross lewdness law was an unconstitutional “blanket prohibition against public nudity.”

But the SJC concluded that the lower court erred, noting that previous SJC decisions had narrowed the application of the law so it doesn’t prohibit protected conduct (allowing, for example, nude go-go dancing in bars).

The court sent the case, Commonwealth v. Ria Ora, back to the lower court for further proceedings.

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