Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2015/09/03/16-year-old-girl-who-took-nude.html
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The girl was listed on a warrant as both the adult perpetrator and the minor victim of two counts of sexual exploitation of minor - second-degree exploitation for making her photo and third-degree exploitation for having her photo in her possession.
I honestly don’t understand this. Is this a make-work effort by the local DA? What’s the point?
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The person who entered the charges is a sociopath, and gets off on exerting power over people who can’t resist in situations where it is safe to do so. This is why laws like this are a bad idea.
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We really, really, really need to update our laws on this.
20 years ago people rarely took nude pics of them selves and shared. While I can remember goofing around in my early 20s, taking it to Walmart of all places, the results were 2 hard copies easily controlled. And I would dare say no one under 18 was doing this.
Times have changed. Teens have always been getting naked and sexy with one another, now they have ways to discretely tease and entice each other. This should not be a crime. Period.
Exploitation of children, voyeur pictures of pervs, actual child porn should be illegal. But there is a big difference between a 16 year old showing off her boobs and any of that.
Change the laws already. We need to update with technology. This should be a no brainer Does one of Obama’s kids need to screw up before the government wakes up and realizes the laws suck?
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…it’s rarely been so relevant to call something so utterly Kafkaesque.
Boils down to some authority telling teenagers nudity is bad until he approves. It will be as effective as that always is.
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I wonder what kind of time she could get if she admitted to masturbating? Surely that would be considered a far more serious crime since it involves physical contact with the minor.
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Well, unless the person making the photos at Wal-Mart made personal copies, too. Still, not as easily shared as a digital pic taken from the phone, but there is still the danger of them spreading further than one would like, however limited…
Also, gentlemen take polaroids… duh!
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I don’t understand it either. But I am curious about precedent for committing crimes against oneself. I’ve heard about attempted murder charges for attempted suicide. But I’m not a lawyer and I have no idea if that one is true or not. I’d like to know more about the state charging people as both perp and victim of self-crime.
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Germany recently reformed child porn laws, making them quite a bit stricter overall. Being unexpectedly reasonable, they actually created an exemption for things like this.
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Suicide was illegal in England & Wales until 1961, attempted suicide was a crime you could be imprisoned for.
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We thought that was a risk, but I worked at Walmart (not at the time) and knew how the photo people worked. At that time it was pretty much all automatic. You put the film in and it spit out the pics. Unless the pic was the first one facing the pile, they probably would never see it. They had other things to do than sit there and watch each photo come out.
And the harsh lighting from disposable camera we used (no instagram filters!) and the fact, well, we weren’t exactly Adonis and Aphrodite, I am not sure anyone would WANT to make copies had they seen them. At the same time we both kinda like the element of danger that we might be found out.
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I was wondering from the headline why the boyfriend wasn’t involved, but turns out he was. Also charged for having his own nudes of himself and one with the girlfriend.
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Maybe.
Or maybe he feels like he is punishing her for immoral behavior.
Which of course is not the scope of the law.
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Shit, being gay was a crime in the UK until 1967.
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Also stupid. Along with a higher age of consent for homosexual sex until 2001.
Speaking of age of consent…
The two in this story were both above the age of consent, so they were allowed to have sex, but not take photos of each other?
Edit: or take photos of themselves for each other, even.
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I know this isn’t the case with this kind of charge, but it would be great if she could just decide not to press charges against herself.
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Stokes put Denson on probation for a year. He ordered her to pay $200 in court costs, stay in school, take a class on how to make good decisions, refrain from using illegal drugs or alcohol, not possess a cellular phone for the duration of her probation and to do 30 hours of community service.So no cellphone for a year, for the 16 year old girl. That seems like an appropriate sentence for sexting with her similarly-aged boyfriend. /s
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Doubleplus good story!
A little time in Room 101 and MinLuv will have her right as rain.
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It doesn’t have to make sense, it’s a law!
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Isn’t that why the police exist? To protect us from ourselves? (And who will protect us from the police?..)
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