Man Sentenced For Groping Minnie Mouse!
Posted by: Kate Torgovnick
Filed in:
news
12:20PM, Tuesday August 11th 2009
In June, 60-year-old grandpa John Moyer visited Walt Disney World. He was hanging in Toontown when he ran into Minnie Mouse. As he took a photo with her, he reached up and gave her fake-mouse boobs a little squeeze. Just for good measure, he patted her on the butt. The grandkids were watching. The woman playing Minnie complained to her boss, who had Moyer arrested, according to Click Orlando. This week, he went on trial and was just sentenced to two days in jail, 180 days probation, and 50 hours of community service—all of which he must do before he can head home to Pennsylvania.
The best part of this whole story? The courtroom exchanges.
“It doesn’t matter she was grabbed. She’s just a mouse,” argued the prosecutor. “It’s not just a mouse. It’s a person ... It’s not OK to go to the diner and pinch a waitress’ butt anymore, and it’s not OK to go to a theme park and pinch a character’s butt.”
The defense attorney stressed the incident happened in front of many people, none of whom thought anything was wrong. Also, Minnie didn’t say anything! The prosecutor countered that since Disney actors are fired for breaking character, she was terrified of losing her job.
Is John Moyer a mousy perv? Or a guy who got caught doing something stupid?
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skywalk
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 11:24 am: [report]
Why would you sexual assault Minnie period but in front of your grandkids?? This is kinda scary what we he would have done in a different situation?
la calme avant la tempête
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 11:33 am: [report]
Skywalk: He didn’t “sexually assault” Minnie, he gave a squeeze in a fake mouse boob.
While I agree that this is inappropriate macho behaviour, in very poor taste (def in front of children) and shows little respect for the actress, I suspect he thought he was being funny (quod non).
Not saying we should applaud this kind of behaviour, but it’s a bit off the mark to lable him as a dangerous sexual assaulter based on this.
Rose
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 11:34 am: [report]
I think it’s sad that she was so afraid of losing her job by “breaking character”, she didn’t feel that she could protest. WTF is that about, they can’t yell no when groped, because they might get fired?
_jsw_
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 11:42 am: [report]
Good grief.
Yes, it was inappropriate. But I have my doubts as to how inappropriate his behavior actually was, as opposed to how much she overreacted. Given that no one else, including fellow Disney employees and the vaunted Disney see-everything-everywhere security cams didn’t catch more, I’m not sure he actually did anything criminally wrong.
I’m not a fan of groping. But hugging those puffy cartoon characters, you don’t always end up being absolutely sure where your hands are. If he groped her breasts, fine, that was wrong. But if he just had his hands on her fake stuffed Minnie boobs? I don’t see the crime.
skywalk
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 12:13 pm: [report]
Okay sexual assault is a little much (harsh), but why did he have to act sexual in any manner to minnie in front of his grandchildren. He wasn’t at a bar with his friends trying to show off it just doesn’t make sense to me.
writergirl
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 12:37 pm: [report]
He’s a perv, but I don’t think he should have been criminaly charged.
Its DISNEY for God’s sake—why would you do that? I mean, really—what the hell could be going through your mind?
bumble_bee
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 01:35 pm: [report]
i think that he was just being stupid. and then, got caught being stupid. it is just a mouse costume, granted there is a lady on the inside, but still. its not like he was humping her leg or sticking his tounge in her ear or something. it could be worse. stupid people make stupid decisions and then get caught.
CuteinOhio
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 01:54 pm: [report]
OMG, this reminds me of a story about my sister. When she was 5 we went to Disney World and all she wanted to do was find Minnie. Finally at the end of the day, we spotted her across the street. My sister ran right up to her and jumped with all her strength RIGHT on Minnie’s foot as hard as she could. Minnie, still in character, started hopping around in pain but to the actresses credit, didn’t make any noise. We still laugh about this to this day. My sister claimed at the time that she just wanted to see if Minnie was real. Those characters must take so much abuse…
Kate Torgovnick
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 03:35 pm: [report]
Yeah, I’m still split on this one myself. I have a feeling this guy didn’t actually think he was doing anything appropriate. But still—leave Minnie alone.
CuteInOhio, thank you for sharing that hilarious story. My friend donned the ChuckEE Cheese suit in high school and I doubt he would’ve been as forgiving as this Minnie.
bood523
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 07:52 pm: [report]
for consistency of shape, the costumes do have a few pads here and there, but minnie has never had “boobs”. she’s a pear shape just like mickey. If this jerk squeezed a breast (even if there was padding between his hand and the actual breast) he wasn’t squeezing “a fake stuffed boob” he was groping the performer. That *is* assault. (assault =/= rape guys, it’s an actual term for when you touch someone who doesn’t want you to touch them.) If she had been working anywhere else, no one would have questioned her calling the police. Additionally, Disney is a company like any other. While there are security cameras with views of large public areas (like you would find in your local wal-mart parking lot) there are by no means “see everything everywhere” cameras. The fact that the company didn’t have a tape of him in the act does not mean he didn’t do anything wrong. There is not surveillance camera trained on any of the character greeting areas, so there is no reason to expect such a tape.
_jsw_
wrote on August 11 2009 @ 08:33 pm: [report]
@bood523: Ah, well, I haven’t seen Minnie in a while and assumed there was more padding. Point taken, it was assault if it was as reported.
theattack
wrote on August 12 2009 @ 02:01 am: [report]
@jsw:
Even if he didn’t touch any actual body part, the intent is still there. Even if her body was not actually groped, his intention was to grope her body. He was just misguided by the suit. She may not be Minnie Mouse, but he’s a grown man. He knows there is a real person under that costume. If someone is trying to rape someone else but doesn’t do it because they can’t see what they’re doing in the dark, does that make them innocent? If you break in to rob a place but can’t find what you’re looking for to steal, does that make it okay? No.
theattack
wrote on August 12 2009 @ 02:08 am: [report]
We as a culture need to stop trying to prove that these hate crimes toward women are not happening. We need to stop justifying what is being done, and we need to stop drilling the women as if they’re the ones who did something wrong by being violated. Do not judge her for reporting something that happened to her if it was not welcome, and don’t judge her for not doing something at the time it happened (not saying anyone is). If the gesture was not welcome and it made her uncomfortable, then it is harassment. Not to mention how humiliating that must have been for her. I can’t imagine!
Keesh Mia
wrote on August 12 2009 @ 07:59 am: [report]
He is a creep. I am glad he was prosecuted. People need to take this seriously. When I was a waitress in my younger days, my butt was always black and blue from customers pitching and grabbing. It’s upsetting but I was afraid that if I’d complained, I’d lose my job if the customer made a scene. I am glad Disney took action.
_jsw_
wrote on August 12 2009 @ 08:36 am: [report]
@theattack: I’m adamantly against sexual crimes against women - anyone, for that matter - but I didn’t feel as if this was necessarily a sexual assault until I read what bood523 had written. My assumption had been that the costume completely encased the actor, and so any “body parts” would be pure costume. Under that assumption, this wasn’t sexual assault to me, just something done in terribly poor taste. Squeezing fake costume breasts wouldn’t be assault. However, if in fact that area of the costume is just cloth over the actor’s actual breasts, my opinion changes. Likewise, if he smacked mere cloth over her butt, that’s different than smacking the rear of a padded costume.
To me, this is clearly different than the waitress scenario, where it’s obviously someone in regular clothing and where touches, grabs, etc. are clearly felt and are assault.
However, since none of us were there, none of us knows what actually happened. He might be a pervert who assaulted her, and she might have overreacted to something that wasn’t actually an assault of any sort but was instead a stupid action on his part.
diablita
wrote on August 12 2009 @ 08:58 pm: [report]
What if the actor inside the costume had been male? Would the charges still be the same? Something to make you think about…with how tall those characters are, I would be surprised if they have never used a male actor for a female character.
Amberguessa
wrote on August 20 2009 @ 12:01 am: [report]
as a character at a theme park myself, I can tell you that this happens ALL THE TIME. the only reason that this one got so far is that the man was stupid enough to do it in front of a bunch of witnesses. padding or no padding, if you SQUEEZE a characters chest area, and they are a girl, there is a very big chance you will feel their actual boob. honestly in all the cases i’ve seen at the park i work at the guest is usually thrown out and then banned from the park, sometimes they’re even banned from every single one of our parks.