That’s just what our nation’s youth need to advance into working society, crippling college debt and criminal records. Yup. I bet the same parents that wanted K-12 administration and teachers to deal with their inability to parent but hamstrung their ability to do so, now want the colleges to deal with their kids and as a last resort the law and judicial system. Sorry, but I don’t see any good coming out of any of this. it starts when your kids are young, when you say no, when you set boundaries and when you model behavior…
Did anyone see this case?
“In North Carolina you are considered an adult at 16 years old as far as being charged,” Swain said. “But to disseminate and receive sexually explicit texts, photos or videos, you must be over 18.”
And so it was that in February, the two teenagers were arrested for sexually exploiting … themselves.
Charging documents listed Copening as both the culprit (as an adult) and the victim (as a minor), simply for snapping a nude photo of himself in the mirror and sending it to his girlfriend…
“It’s ludicrous,” Fred Lane, a computer security and privacy expert, told the Guardian. “It’s crazy. It’s an overreach.” He explained that such laws stem from the 1983 Supreme Court decision upholding a ban on child porn, but that many state laws were woefully outdated in our current era of cellphones and texting.
But Mary Anne Franks, the University of Miami law professor, said the issue is simpler still: It’s all about consent.
“This [case] demonstrates an utter failure to understand the nature of sexual exploitation,” she wrote in an e-mail to The Post. “Consensual sexual activity among peers should not be a crime; we should not allow our social hysteria over teen sexual activity to justify prosecutions that will destroy teenagers’ lives ‘for their own good.’ ”
Franks was alluding to Sgt. Swain’s suggestion that authorities were “saving” the teens from themselves — by arresting them."
The North Carolina case gets at what I’m wondering about in the Canon City case too: where are the victims? In the Canon City case I can imagine that there might be victims-- students whose pictures were circulated without their consent, or students who felt harassed by others sending them unwanted nude pictures-- but so far, we haven’t heard about any victims.
All of these cases illustrate what can happen when laws are well intentioned, but poorly constructed, and then enforced by overly zealous DA’s and prosecutors.
“so far, we haven’t heard about any victims”
So you don’t think the 12 year old girl who sent her picture out to someone and it got passed on isn’t a victim?
I hadn’t heard about that 12-year-old. Do you have a link?
I’ll try and find it. It was an interview with someone taking about it.
The dissemination of the underage picture to people who weren’t intended to see it should be a crime. But I don’t agree that it ought to be a crime for a fellow minor to possess it if the subject sent it. I think that’s madness.
“Just because it’s a lot of kids doesn’t mean that they are all “innocent” and none of them should be punished.”
It does mean that we’ve got a normative behavior here, and it might make sense to have the law take that into account when we’re deciding who is being exploited.
The CC school district seems to be saying that it is a felony under Colorado law for a student to take a photo of themselves and send it, if one is a minor. 18 year old senior girl takes a topless photo and sends it to her 17.5 year old BF. Felony for both: her for taking and sending it, him for possessing it.
An adult can legally take a topless photo of herself. So she wouldn’t be committing a crime by taking the picture.
She can take it. But she commits the felony by sending it to boyfriend, who is still six months from majority.
BF’s mom happens to be standing over his shoulder when the photo from GF arrives. She says “delete that now!” She has tampered with evidence.
The Colorado case will be interesting for law students to watch, but tragic for all the students ensnared by laws that were supposed to protect them.
Thought I’d append this story to this thread: high school football player in Alabama has admitted carrying an unconscious younger girl upstairs, raping her and then boasting about it at the party. And there is apparently video of him carrying her and then boasting. She was actually unconscious. The girl woke up in pain and and went to the hospital. He wears an ankle bracelet and is banned from school while on bail. And a whole bunch of kids, including member of the team, go all out to support … the rapist of course! Why would anyone think they’d support the girl? [Here’s a story](Students SUPPORT Cameron Harrison accused of raping unconscious girl | Daily Mail Online) with pictures.
[Here is a local story](http://www.fox10tv.com/story/30446329/ada-rape-victim-was-intoxicated-unconscious): ““You cannot rape an unconscious girl. It doesn’t matter if you’re a high school athlete star, it doesn’t matter what your future holds. It doesn’t matter you cannot do this. There is a problem in our society with people feeling entitled to do whatever they wish and it is wrong. I want the kids in this county to get this message: if you do this to another person, you will be prosecuted,” said Baldwin County Assistant District Attorney, Chalea Tisdale.”
And this: "Prosecutors says the victim has been harassed on social media. The judge said anyone taunting or harassing the victim will face consequences. “She has had some blow back. I would also like to send the message that will be dealt with very harshly. I do not expect this girl to be bullied. I do not expect her to suffer any more as a result of what he has done to her and if there is any intimidation going on and I will attend to that as well,” said Tisdale.
My reaction: I suppose this is a “teachable moment” but the school needs to punish people for doing this. I also want to note the police and justice system seem to be doing the right thing.
@Lergnom, that is despicable.
And of course in the comments on the newspaper article, we find person after person saying she shouldn’t have gotten drunk and passed out, and it’s her fault.
Ugh! And people question that we have a rape culture in our society?!?
It’s Steubenville all over again. Hopefully there will be a felony conviction here, too.
Another local case: 21 year old male and 15 year old female had a consensual sexual relationship in Ohio. Girl was too young to legally consent. Male served 12 days in jail and was placed on 25 years of sex offender registry. He argued that the offender status was disproportionate to the jail sentence and the underlying offense. The Ohio Supreme Court yesterday ruled 5-2 that the sex offender registry is appropriate.
A dissenting justice wrote “For offenders like B****, these registration requirements guarantee an unnecessarily long term of public humiliation only, and they effectively destroy any hope of leading a successful and productive life from that point forward.”
I hate those sex offender registries-- for anybody, even violent rapists. If we want to shame felons, why don’t we have white collar crime registries?
I say if the person pays their debt to society, they shouldn’t have to sign a wall of shame.
I just can’t get over the mindset of someone who wants to have sex with someone who’s unconscious. Wouldn’t it be like doing so with a corpse?
Raping an unconscious person: he deserves prison.