WESTFIELD – A city man who admitted he posted nude pictures of his former girlfriend on a fraudulent page he created on a social networking website has been placed on probation for one year.
Josh D. Champagne, 20, of 1 Magnolia Ave., Holyoke, came to police attention in March when a woman came to the station to complain that he “secretly took photographs of her and posted the photographs on her place of business Face Book page under a fraudulent account in her name”, Det. Roxann Bradley reports in a court document.
Bradley reports she interviewed the woman and viewed the two offending photos. She reports that the photographs were taken from behind the woman and show her standing in her bedroom. In one picture she is wearing underwear and in the second photo she is naked. Bradley recognized the background of the two pictures to be the victim’s bedroom.
“The victim stated that she had no knowledge of those photographs being taken and that she never consented to having those photographs taken,” Bradley reported.
The victim told Bradley that she confronted her former boyfriend, who she said she had a relationship with for about a year, via a text message and he admitted, by return text message, that he had taken the photos, apologized for posting them to the Internet and promised to take the site down.
Champagne also told the woman that he would avoid being served with a restraining order so he could continue to see her. He refused to tell her where he was living but told her that he was no longer living at his parent’s home in Holyoke.
Bradley asked the court to issue a warrant, since his whereabouts could not be determined, and he eventually appeared in Westfield District Court where he was arraigned on two charges of disseminating photos of an unsuspecting nude person.
Champagne appeared before Judge Philip A. Contant on yesterday and was allowed to submit to facts sufficient to warrant a guilty finding for one of the two charges. The second charge was not prosecuted.
He was placed on probation for one year and assessed $90.
