A man who filmed up the skirts of women shopping in Napier is facing a possible prison sentence.

Richard Snook, 42, bought a video camera at a Napier pawnbroker on January 31, put it in his bag and wandered around town getting as close as he could to women in skirts or dresses.

He also took the camera to Marine Parade and covertly filmed a girl aged about 10 as she played in the Tom Parker fountain, naked from the waist down.

Snook made the mistake of leaving his bag at an associate's house.

The associate returned it to the Sideline bar in Onekawa, where they had both been drinking the previous night.

Bar manager Tony Garrett said staff searched the bag to see if they could find its owner's name. "We usually find cellphones or something else we can use to track down the owner.

"We couldn't find anything but one of the guys found the camera so had a look to see if he could identify someone. He got quite a shock at what he saw and called the cops straight away."

On the camera were three separate recordings, each taken while the camera was placed in a bag and facing upwards.

According to a police court summary, Snook wandered in and out of shops along Napier's Emerson St and "on each occasion he walks up behind a female wearing a skirt or dress and manoeuvres the bag under her dress so as to capture on film the female's underwear".

When police spoke to him, he admitted doing this on "five or six occasions" and said he "tries to get the camera as close as he can under her skirt".

He said he liked filming girls and women for sexual excitement.

Snook appeared in the Napier District Court yesterday and pleaded guilty to four charges of making an intimate visual recording. The charge carries a maximum sentence of three years in jail.

He was remanded on bail and will appear for sentencing in July.