Juvenile pornographers????

[Brian Ellis]

Another crazy case of young teenagers being accused of child pornography. Apparently, a 13 y-o boy sent a mobile phone pic of a girl friend in a state of partial undress and he may become a registered sex offender for life, as may a handful of other boys who received it.

[KRSESQ]

Yeah, this is idiotic. What's even more idiotic is putting a camera in EVERY cel phone, and putting cel phones in the hands of EVERY TEENAGER, and then being shocked when the inevitable happens.

The child porn laws on the books were written to punish adults for preying on children. They were not written to punish children for indulging in childish behavior. The fact that DAs are prosecuting such cases is a little infuriating.

Kevin

[Gurm]

It's the fault of the parents of the girl, at least in part.

Parent: Oh my God, my precious princess is NAKED on a PICTURE! SOMEONE MUST DIE!

DA: Well, it's not really a crime for your 14 year old to play doctor with her boyfriend...

Parent: SHE'S NAKED! IN A PICTURE! OMFGKILLKILLKILL!

DA: Well it's a picture, I _guess_ we could prosecute under anti-porno laws...

Parent: OMG SHE'S IN PORNO! AAAAAGH KILLKILLKILLKILL DO IT GET THOSE BASTARDS KILL!

See how this works? Nobody thinks to criticize the parents for not raising their daughter right, or for giving their 14 year old a cell phone with unlimited minutes and SMS messages.

[Dr Mordrid]

If we wanted to see our girlfriends naked as 'tweens we'd just wait for the weekend when we all went skinny dipping at the back 40's pond, right where all our parents & grandparents did. So much for farm kids being 'square'

Agreed: every adult in these cases is acting stupidly.

[az]

It's the fault of the parents of the girl, at least in part.

Yes, in part. But law shouldn't be as wide open to misuse as this one seems to be, because experience tells us people WILL act stupid and people WILL try and get everything they want out of a law that isn't watertight. There should just be a minimum age barrier of some kind.

[Dr Mordrid]

The way things usually play out here is kids of any age (that's right: no limit) get charged as adults, but up to 17 the juvenile court judges decide if they're going to cede jurisdiction to the adult courts. Youths as young as 11 have been convicted of murder as adults.

[Nowhere]

Perhaps not minimum age barrier, but some kind of minimum age difference between the participants that needs to be violated in order to even contemplate prosecution (still can't lead straight to it). And that includes not only photos/etc. but also age of consent.

Sort of like it's, supposedly, generally fine in most societies to date/be with somebody who is of age "half + ~7 years".



We also have related social scare/scandals here from some time...and the two laws that are supposed to "end it once and for all" have the potentiall to open entirely new can of worms:

a) Secretly recording somebody in intimate situation = criminal offense; I guess people will have to secure written statements before the act or smth (after all - such recordings/photos are by their very nature private; usually only two people know about them. Only one needs to have change of heart...)

b) Drawings treated similarly to photos in regards to "juvenile acts/pornography"; does anybody keep birth certificates of cartoon/anime characters? Or...depends on how perverted judge one stumbles upon.

[Gurm]

Well that's the thing. There are substantial circumstances in which you can't be prosecuted for statutory rape if you're also a minor. Actually in most states (federal? Not sure...) it's "age difference <= 2 years" or some such. So a 19-year-old (who is an "adult") can sleep with a 17-year-old without fear of prosecution.

The problem here is that nobody bothered writing such a sanity check into the "child pornography" laws. And it's hard to argue for such a sanity check - think about it. How would that be worded? "Oh, so long as the person coercing hardcore sex pics out of a 14-year-old is only 16, it's not a crime"? I can't think of a sensible way, because we define a minor as being unable to provide consent, and while sexual intercourse is by definition a limited act (it happens, then it ends), porn is forever in the digital age. So while the girl could, in theory, provide consent for her boyfriend to take the picture AT THE TIME IT WAS TAKEN, it's hard to argue that she provides consent for everyone with whom the boyfriend might at some point share that picture.

This is one of those legal minefields where nobody wants to set precedent, and the hope is that SOMEONE has a heaping helping of common sense - which doesn't seem to be the case here.

[Dr Mordrid]

IIRC in most states the age differential is 7 years.

[az]

The way things usually play out here is kids of any age (that's right: no limit) get charged as adults, but up to 17 the juvenile court judges decide if they're going to cede jurisdiction to the adult courts. Youths as young as 11 have been convicted of murder as adults.

Yeah, it's stupid.

[az]

Well that's the thing. There are substantial circumstances in which you can't be prosecuted for statutory rape if you're also a minor. Actually in most states (federal? Not sure...) it's "age difference <= 2 years" or some such. So a 19-year-old (who is an "adult") can sleep with a 17-year-old without fear of prosecution.

The problem here is that nobody bothered writing such a sanity check into the "child pornography" laws. And it's hard to argue for such a sanity check - think about it. How would that be worded? "Oh, so long as the person coercing hardcore sex pics out of a 14-year-old is only 16, it's not a crime"? I can't think of a sensible way, because we define a minor as being unable to provide consent, and while sexual intercourse is by definition a limited act (it happens, then it ends), porn is forever in the digital age. So while the girl could, in theory, provide consent for her boyfriend to take the picture AT THE TIME IT WAS TAKEN, it's hard to argue that she provides consent for everyone with whom the boyfriend might at some point share that picture.

I don't see the problem. The 16-year-old wouldn't, ccouldn't, shouldn't be charged for child pornography or anything as outrageous, but could still face charges of violating her personality rights.

Legislation for the protection of privacy has been in place for a while; this anti-child-porn stuff isn't about that. It's about protecting minors from being taken advantage of by adults.

And there isn'ta clear line you can draw between a youth and an adult. For practical purposes, law draws that line on the eighteenth birthday, but it also acknowledges that this is a crutch: There are age difference regulations in laws regulating age of consent, there are (in many countries) some years during young adulthood in which a court can decide whether to treat you as an adult or a youth. There is no reason not to have this kind of regulation apply here as well, especially since laws like this one have the potential to entirely and thoroughly destroy people's lifes (especially in the US).

[cjolley]

I don't see the problem. The 16-year-old wouldn't, couldn't, shouldn't be charged for child pornography or anything as outrageous, but could still face charges of violating her personality rights.

It's problematic because of questions like: "What if that 16 year old distributes that photo to 10,000 pedophiles?"

If his defense is that he just posted it on the internet, well guess what, that's exposing her to at least 10,000 pedophiles.

Writing laws that cover complex issues like this is complicated and cannot be done without creating some unintended consequences. I guess the question is how to create the fewest unintended consequences.

Here is an article that discusses the problem:

http://www.slate.com/id/2211169/

[az]

We can't take all the responsibility away from the vitctim and lay it all on the shoulders of the committer of the same age. The committer, if in the same age bracket, should face consequences of violating the victim's personal rights. One cannot hold against him or her that there are perverts out there.

If the culprit were to sell the pictures, it would be a different matter altogether.

[cjolley]

From the article I linked to:

...
One quick clue that the criminal justice system is probably not the best venue for addressing the sexting crisis? A survey of the charges brought in the cases reflects that—depending on the jurisdiction—prosecutors have charged the senders of smutty photos, the recipients of smutty photos, those who save the smutty photos, and the hapless forwarders of smutty photos with the same crime: child pornography. Who is the victim here and who is the perpetrator? Everybody and nobody.
There may be an argument for police intervention in cases that involve a genuine threat or cyber-bullying, such as a recent Massachusetts incident in which the picture of a naked 14-year-old girl was allegedly sent to more than 100 cell phones, or a New York case involving a group of boys who turned a nude photo of a 15-year-old girl into crude animations and PowerPoint presentations. But are such cases really the same as the cases in which tipsy teen girls send their boyfriends naughty Valentine's Day pictures?

...

Now sit down and try to write a paragraph or two in real words that would make those distinctions in a court of law, without creating LOTS of unintended consequences.
Keep in mind that there are thousands of prosecutors out there and the law of averages says some of them are not going to have the good judgment one might hope for.

[The PIT]

It's problematic because of questions like: "What if that 16 year old distributes that photo to 10,000 pedophiles?"

I'd say see a shrink you're getting paranoid. Same argument is used to stop parents filming their kids in plays.