Masseur Arrested
Secretly Videotaped Clients
By Daniel Muniz

A professional masseur has committed what is probably the worst nightmare to his clients, outside of physical assault. He rigged up hidden cameras to covertly videotape his female customers while they were taking their clothes off in preparation for the massages and therapy that he was going to administer to them. He accumulated video footage of over 100 women, including minors under the age of 14.

Richard Filbin owned and operated the Body and Soul Massage Therapy in Cross Lanes West Virginia. This middle-aged pervert intended to secretly tape his female clients for his own sexual gratification.

He even managed to videotape customers who went over to his house for massages. His home was also rigged with more hidden cameras to accommodate his growing client base outside of work hours. He apparently didn’t mind bringing his work home with him since it provided additional opportunities for more illicit videos.

None of his customers were aware of this clandestine operation and that was exactly the way he wanted it. And this peeping tom was able to keep his ruse on unsuspecting women for a number of years.

In fact, the way his scam was uncovered was purely by accident.

After having an altercation with his wife, Filbin was served with a protective warrant against him. As a result, he had to immediately leave his house. So without him properly securing his own personal effects from prying eyes, his wife inadvertently stumbled upon his videos.

Naturally, she was horrified to discover that her husband had clandestinely videotaped her without her knowledge.

Although such a juvenile prank could possibly be resolved at the cost of a few huge arguments, his wife became totally disgusted to find out that his collection contained the more than one hundred women that he had also filmed. And since she was videotaped without her knowledge and consent, she immediately deduced that the women on these tapes also didn’t know that they too were being recorded.

Filbin’s wife immediately contacted the police.

After an investigation, he was then slapped with 114 counts of criminal invasion.

The local community was outraged. Many of his customers thought very highly of Filbin in that they considered him to be a professional who did a good job and enjoyed his work. And some clients were upset that they had recommended this peeping tom to their friends and family members.

However, all the charges on Filbin were misdemeanors including the ones involving minors. Prosecutors wanted felonies leveled against him because of the juveniles but since the children were not in sexually explicit positions when they were taking their clothes off, they couldn’t apply that statute to him.

Another problem that prosecutors experienced was that many of the women that this pervert videotaped were now too humiliated to be part of the prosecution. Consequently, Filbin was then able to cop a plea in which he would admit to guilt to 12 misdemeanor counts while the other 102 counts were dropped. This resulted in a sentence of two years for prison and another two years of probation plus court costs.

So in other words, he got off pretty easy. Some of his victims were not happy at all although there was not much more that prosecutors could do until West Virginia laws get revamped.

And since this kind of video equipment is now becoming ridiculously cheap and increasingly miniaturized, voyeurism crimes like this are on a sharp rise throughout the country, mostly because of the ease to secretly record people without their knowledge. As a result, some states have now elevated these offenses to felonies with much harsher penalties. And many more state legislatures have begun to grapple with this growing phenomenon, so in the time the sentences will become increasingly tougher.

Of course beefed up legislations won’t stop all the perverts but harsher sentences will be highly effective in deterring the immature people who are open to trying a juvenile prank like this.

Sadly, some perverts cannot be helped.

On a side note, Filbin also had a checkered past when he was once a tennis coach at a local high school. He used that position to gain favor with underage girls by providing them with cigarettes and alcohol. He even tried to get these girls to flash their breasts to him. So a bad apple like Filbin is just going to try to find new angles to fulfill his sexual gratification.

But for the most part, peeping toms like the one in this incident need to be harshly punished. His female customers had an expectation of privacy when they utilized his services and he breached that trust. More states need to take these kinds of violations, especially when they involve minors, more seriously.

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