Nevada Revised Statute § 201.220 prohibits indecent exposure, which is exposing your genitalia or anus either in public or in a private place open to public view. A conviction requires sex offender registration even if no touching occurs and no one is offended.
A first offense of indecent exposure is usually a gross misdemeanor, carrying up to 364 days in jail and/or $2,000. A subsequent offense is a category D felony, carrying one to four years in Nevada State Prison and up to $5,000.
In many cases, we can persuade the prosecutor to plea bargain indecent exposure charges down to a lesser offense or even a dismissal.
In this article, our Las Vegas criminal defense attorneys will address the following key issues regarding indecent exposure:
- 1. Elements of NRS 201.220
- 2. Sex Offender Registration
- 3. Penalties
- 4. Defenses
- 5. Record Sealing
- 6. Immigration Consequences
- 7. Open or Gross Lewdness
- 8. Related Crimes
- Additional Reading
1. Elements of NRS 201.220
For you to be convicted of indecent exposure in Nevada, prosecutors have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the following two elements:
- You exposed your genitalia or anus or someone else’s genitalia or anus, and
- The exposure occurred in public or in a private place where the public could see in.1
According to the Nevada Supreme Court, NRS 201.220 does not prohibit exposing breasts or buttocks. In practice, however, police often arrest women for going topless and arrest men or women for mooning.
Therefore, if you are charged with indecent exposure for flashing your breasts or backsides, we should hopefully get the cases dismissed once we remind the D.A. of the Nevada Supreme Court’s interpretation of NRS 201.220.2
Typical Indecent Exposure Cases
Most NRS 201.220 cases involve flashers, exhibitionists, or people engaged in sexual activity in public. Many defendants are:
- partiers,
- patrons of adult bookstores,
- people hooking up in parks or bathrooms, or
- people urinating in public.
We also had cases where people were arrested for walking naked in their own home by an open window or in their own backyard. It is irrelevant if you are alone and no one actually witnesses the exposure: All that matters is that you expose yourself in a manner where people could see you.
Note that it is not considered indecent or obscene exposure in Nevada for a mother to breastfeed her child.3
Indecent exposure in Nevada is when you intentionally expose your or another person’s genitals or anus.
2. Sex Offender Registration
If you are convicted of violating NRS 201.220 as a gross misdemeanor instead of a felony, you are usually classified as a tier I offender for 15 years.
Tier I offenders cannot be searched in the Nevada Sex Offender Registry unless the victim — if any — was a child. Plus, it may be possible to get off the registry after only 10 years.
If you are convicted of indecent exposure as a felony, then you may be required to register as a tier II offender for 25 years. In this case you would be publicly searchable, and you cannot get off the registry early.4
3. Penalties
The punishment for violating NRS 201.220 depends on whether you had prior sex crime convictions or if you were in the presence of a child or disabled person, as the following table shows.
| Indecent Exposure Conviction | Nevada Sentence |
| First offense (you have no previous indecent exposure convictions or other sex offense convictions) | Gross misdemeanor: Up to 364 days in jail and/or $2,000. |
| Subsequent offense (you have at least one previous indecent exposure conviction or another sex offense conviction) | Category D felony: 1 to 4 years in prison and up to $5,000. |
| First or subsequent offense in the presence of a child under 18 or a disabled person | Category D felony: 1 to 4 years in prison and up to $5,000. |
Plus, as mentioned earlier, a Nevada conviction for indecent exposure triggers a requirement to register as a sex offender.
Note that judges do take extenuating circumstances into account when doling out punishments. For example, a person who strips in a public place would probably receive a harsher punishment than someone who walks naked in front of an open window at home without realizing it.5
Plea Bargains
Depending on the situation, prosecutors may be willing to reduce your NRS 201.220 charge to a misdemeanor that carries no sex offender registration such as disorderly conduct.
If we can demonstrate to the D.A. that the evidence is too insufficient or inadequate to sustain a conviction, the D.A. may drop the charges completely.
Many people convicted of violating NRS 201.220 can often get probation instead of jail.
4. Defenses
Here at Las Vegas Defense Group, we have represented literally thousands of people charged with sex crimes including indecent exposure. In our experience, the following four defenses have proven very effective with Nevada prosecutors, judges, and juries at getting these charges reduced or dropped.
Note that it is not a defense to NRS 201.220 charges that you had no intention to offend anyone.6
1) You Were Misidentified
It is not uncommon for the wrong person to be arrested for a crime someone else committed. This is especially typical in large crowds, where police may have trouble distinguishing between suspects.
Example: Wendy is attending the Electric Daisy Carnival when a policeman suddenly arrests her for flashing her vagina to the band. Wendy knows she is innocent, so her defense attorney obtains surveillance video of the event. The footage shows that the woman next to Wendy flashed but that Wendy remained clothed the whole time. When the D.A. sees that the police simply made a mistake and apprehended the wrong person, Wendy’s charges get dismissed.
Other evidence that may be valuable in these types of cases includes eyewitnesses and photographs. If we can raise a reasonable doubt as to your guilt, criminal charges cannot stand.
2) You Were Falsely Accused
It is also not uncommon for angry people to accuse innocent people of breaking the law. In these cases, we would try to find evidence that would impeach the accuser’s trustworthiness.
Example: Barbara is resentful that she was rejected from her favorite sorority at UNLV. She leaves several angry voicemails with the sorority president Jennifer claiming that she would be sorry for rejecting her. Then Barbara calls campus police and claims she saw Jennifer on the quad sunbathing nude. Police arrest Jennifer. Though when her defense attorney plays the voicemail for the D.A., the D.A. figures that Barbara made up the whole story and drops the charge against Jennifer.
Note that Barbara in the above example could face criminal prosecution herself for filing a false police report.
3) The Exposure Was Lawful
Sometimes police take a more conservative approach than what the law requires and arrest people for lawful exposure.
Example: During a Fourth of July parade in Downtown Las Vegas, police see a spectator wearing a very skimpy bikini that shows more flesh than fabric. An officer arrests her for indecent exposure. Though when prosecutors look over the photographs taken of her and see that the bikini adequately conceals her genitalia and anus, they drop the charges.
Note that full exposure of your private parts is lawful in certain licensed strip clubs in Nevada. However, you require a work card in order to work as a stripper.
4) The Exposure Was Accidental
Nevada courts do not punish you for accidental or unintentional exposure of your private parts.7
Example: Jennifer is riding an escalator when her skirt gets caught. It pulls off her skirt, revealing that she was not wearing underwear. A security guard sees her in the distance and summons a police officer. Though when the police officer learns that Jennifer did not intentionally expose herself, he lets her go without arresting her.
Note that if Jennifer’s friend pulled down her skirt as a prank, Jennifer would still not face criminal charges because it was not her fault. However, Jennifer’s friend could be charged with violating NRS 201.220 for intentionally exposing Jennifer’s genitalia.
Indecent exposure convictions require registration as a sex offender in Nevada
5. Record Sealing
In Nevada, gross misdemeanor convictions of indecent exposure are sealable two years after the case ends. However, felony convictions of indecent exposure can never be sealed.
Note if your NRS 201.220 charges get dismissed, you can petition for a Nevada record seal immediately.8
6. Immigration Consequences
Several courts have determined that displaying one’s privates does not qualify as a crime of moral turpitude and is therefore not deportable.9
Still, immigration law is in a constant state of flux, and rules change. Non-U.S. citizens who have been accused of any sex offense should hire a skilled lawyer right away to discuss their options.
7. Open or Gross Lewdness
In Nevada, indecent exposure comprises exposing your privates irrespective of whether the motivation is sexual. In contrast, open or gross lewdness (NRS 201.210) refers to sexual acts, specifically:
- having sexual relations in a place where the public may see or
- having non-consensual sexual relations not involving penetration.
Depending on the circumstances of the case, the D.A. may prosecute you for committing both indecent exposure as well as open or gross lewdness. An example would be a naked couple having sexual relations in public: The nudity violates NRS 201.220, and the sex act violates NRS 201.210.
Both crimes carry the same penalties.10
There are many possible ways to fight indecent exposure charges.
8. Related Crimes
Public Urination
In Las Vegas, urinating or defecating in public is a misdemeanor carrying up to $1,000 and/or six months in jail. Typically, police issue a citation instead of placing you under arrest.11
Disorderly Conduct
It is a misdemeanor in Clark County to either:
- Participate in a fight, or challenge a person to a fight;
- Use profane, indecent or obscene language in addressing another person;
- Commit a breach of the peace or incite a disturbance; or
- Annoy or harass any other person in a way to incite a disturbance.
The penalties include up to $1,000 and/or six months in jail. Depending on the extent of the alleged disorderly conduct, police either issue a citation or arrest you.12
Sexual Harassment
Sexual harassment is pestering or bullying someone in a suggestive way. Depending on the case, sexual harassment may be prosecuted in Nevada as indecent exposure, open or gross lewdness, rape, extortion, breaching the peace, stalking, harassment, assault, battery, peering, coercion, and/or as hate crimes.13
Additional Reading
For more in-depth information, refer to these scholarly articles:
- Revealing the Bare Uncertainties of Indecent Exposure – Columbia Journal of Law & Social Problems.
- Criminal Law and Procedure: Indecent Exposure: Nudism – Michigan Law Review.
- Criminal Sanctions against Nude Sunbathing in California – Criminal Justice Journal.
- Constitutional Law-Cruel or Unusual Punishment-Indeterminate Sentence with No Maximum Term for a Second Offense of Indecent Exposure is so Disproportionate to the Crime as to Violate the Cruel or Unusual Punishment Provision of the California Constitution – Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review.
- Indecent exposure: a serious ‘nuisance’ offence – Women’s History Review.
Legal References
- NRS 201.220 – Indecent or obscene exposure; penalty.
1. A person who makes any open and indecent or obscene exposure of his or her person, or of the person of another, is guilty:
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this subsection, for the first offense, of a gross misdemeanor.
(b) For any subsequent offense, or if the person has previously been convicted of a sexual offense as defined in NRS 179D.097, of a category D felony and shall be punished as provided in NRS 193.130.
(c) For an offense committed by a person 18 years of age or older in the presence of a child under the age of 18 years or a vulnerable person as defined in paragraph (a) of subsection 8 of NRS 200.5092, of a category D felony and shall be punished as provided in NRS 193.130.
2. For the purposes of this section, the breast feeding of a child by the mother of the child does not constitute an act of open and indecent or obscene exposure of her body.
- State v. Castaneda (2010) 126 Nev. 478 (“Given the legislature’s use of the common law to define Nev. Rev. Stat. § 201.220’s terms, Nev. Rev. Stat. § 201.220 is limited to the common law prohibition against open and indecent or obscene exposure of one’s genitals or anus…Some discretion, to be sure, applies to determine when and where genital exposure may be open and indecent or obscene, but this is not enough to invalidate the statute on void-for-vagueness grounds.”). Same (“under a generally worded indecent exposure statute like NRS 201.220(1), a defendant who displays only his buttocks but not his anus or his genitals does not commit the offense of indecent exposure.”).
- Same (“Of note, the offense consists of the intentional, open and indecent or obscene exposure, not its visual observation by others.”); Ebeling v. State (2004) 120 Nev. 401 (“We also conclude that NRS 201.220 allows for only one charge of indecent exposure, regardless of the number of victims.“). NRS 201.220. See also Volpicelli v. State (Nev.App. 2024) 548 P.3d 1240 (unpublished).
- NRS 179D.495; NRS 179D.450; NRS 179D.097.
- NRS 201.220. Schmidt v. State (1978) 94 Nev. 665 (“[Defendant’s] six-year sentence does not constitute cruel or unusual punishment for it neither shocks the conscience nor is disproportionate to the offense involved.”)
- Young v. State (1993) 109 Nev. 205 (“A conviction under either NRS 201.210 or NRS 201.220 does not require proof of intent to offend an observer or even that the exposure was observed…It is sufficient that the public sexual conduct or exposure was intentional.”).
- State v. Castaneda, supra (“A defendant must have intended to expose his or her genitals; accidental exposure is not enough.”).
- NRS 179.245. NRS 179.255.
- See, for example, Nunez v. Holder (9th Cir. 2010) 594 F.3d 1124 (“[I]ndecent exposure as defined by Cal. Penal Code § 314, and as construed by California courts, is not categorically a crime involving moral turpitude…”).
- NRS 201.210.
- LVMC 10.40.040.
- CCO 12.33.010.
- NRS 200.575; NRS 200.471; NRS 200.481; NRS 200.603; NRS 207.190; NRS 205.320; NRS 201.220; NRS 201.210; NRS 200.366; NRS 203.010; NRS 193.1675.