More Cops Investigate More Teens 'Sexting.' Now What?

from the waste-of-limited-resources dept

For some reason, a Michigan Sheriff's Department has gotten itself involved in a sexting incident.

An investigation into "sexting" of photographs between at least 31 teenagers in Rochester Community Schools is expected to take at least two more weeks, an Oakland County Sheriff's captain said Thursday…

Capt. Michael Johnson of the Rochester Hills substation said cell phones confiscated from suspected students — 24 girls and 7 boys, ages 14 to 16 — have been turned over to the department's computer crimes section for forensic review to determine who sent photos, who was photographed, who received them and if they were shared with others.

Similar concerns are being expressed by others in the community.

Meanwhile, an attorney for a Rochester Hills student and another involved in a similar investigation in Romeo schools, said the activity is much more widespread and she has heard the number is likely double that under investigation.

Attorney Shannon Smith said Michigan State Police are investigating reports of about 10 incidents in the Romeo school system unrelated to the Rochester cases.

"This is happening everywhere, it's over the top," Smith said. "I have been contacted by schools and parents elsewhere in Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties who have found similar photos on their children's cellphones and want to know what to do about it.

The reason for police involvement -- beyond the slim chance that it could net them some cheap child porn busts, thanks to existing laws being applied badly -- is left unstated. Apparently, the discovery of suggestive and/or explicit photos couldn't be left up to the students and their parents to handle. Instead, somebody will need to be punished for something that appears to be incredibly common and often wholly voluntary.

The Oakland County Sheriff's Department has already confiscated 31 phones. "Ten incidents" unrelated to these 31 cases are being investigated by the Michigan State Police. With any luck, these investigations will continue to turn up even more phones, containing more evidence, and so on, until… well, until what, exactly?

Well, possibly until the shock at how common this behavior is passes and is replaced with the logistic realities of the situation, as happened to Chief Deputy Donald Lowe of the Louisa County (VA) Sheriff's Dept.

[L]ouisa County High School was transformed into a crime scene, which it remained for the next month. Police cars sat parked at the school’s entrance, and inside, a few deputies who reported to Lowe began interviewing kids—starting with girls they recognized in the pictures and boys who had followed the accounts. [...] For the most part, the kids were “more than cooperative,” Lowe says. One person would give up 10 names. The next would give up five, and so on.

But pretty soon this got to be a problem. Within an hour, the deputies realized just how common the sharing of nude pictures was at the school. “The boys kept telling us, ‘It’s nothing unusual. It happens all the time,’ ” Lowe recalls. Every time someone they were interviewing mentioned another kid who might have naked pictures on his or her phone, they had to call that kid in for an interview. After just a couple of days, the deputies had filled multiple evidence bins with phones, and they couldn’t see an end to it. Fears of a cabal got replaced by a more mundane concern: what to do with “hundreds of damned phones. I told the deputies, ‘We got to draw the line somewhere or we’re going to end up talking to every teenager in the damned county!’ ”

So, at some point, an arbitrary line will be drawn to end the investigation. Charges may be handed down, if only to justify the use of police resources. High school students on the wrong end of the age of consent may find themselves facing child pornography charges. Students more than an arbitrary number of years removed from the age of subjects of the photos in their possession may end up similarly charged.

The temptation is to handle it as a criminal offense, hence the initial instinct of the Louisa County Sheriff's Dept. to view it as a "cabal" or "ring" before it became apparent that there was no unified, sinister force compelling this prolific creation of explicit photos. But despite realizing that trying to combat this as a criminal venture was fruitless, they still use a ridiculously skewed term when discussing sexting.

“I really don’t like the word sexting,” says Michael Harmony, the commander of the southern-Virginia branch of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, which covers Louisa County. The term he makes his investigators use is self-production, which is law-enforcement-speak for when minors produce pictures of themselves that qualify as child porn.

Harmony may not be looking to press criminal charges against "self-producers," but phrasing it in this manner makes it clear he's willing to pursue anyone else in possession of this so-called child pornography. Law enforcement entities in other states view it the same way and have pressed (along with concerned parents groups and educators) for the creation of laws that make sexting a crime. In doing so, they have completely subverted common sense.

[I]n most states it is perfectly legal for two 16-year-olds to have sex. But if they take pictures, it’s a matter for the police.

Even if these law enforcement agencies decide there's nothing in this pile of cell phones for them, there's still a chance an aggressive prosecutor will still look for something he or she can make stick -- punishing the children… for the children.

If Lowe made an arrest, the case would land with Rusty McGuire, the main prosecutor for Louisa County. McGuire wouldn’t talk with me about this situation specifically, but he expressed his concern more generally about nude pictures of minors landing in the wrong hands: “What do you do? Turn a blind eye? You’re letting teenagers incite the prurient interest of predators around the country,” fueling a demand that “can only be met by the actual abuse of real children.”

So, to keep teens from being abused by sexual predators, we need to smack them around with the same laws meant to target sexual predators? McGuire pushes a threat that exists only in his mind -- one that turns a mostly consensual and incredibly common act into something that has to be addressed by the full extent of the law ("turn a blind eye?"). Failure to do so tips the balance in favor of child predators, who will only be able to satisfy themselves with actual abusive acts. McGuire was praised here at Techdirt earlier this year for his emphasis on education over enforcement when it comes to students sexting, but a few months removed from the positive Slate profile and he's conjuring up law enforcement's favorite boogeyman to justify law enforcement's intrusion into students' personal lives.

Two different law enforcement entities in Michigan are wading into this situation now, armed with enough info to make headlines but little more. Soon, they'll be swimming in cell phones and trying to find a punishment that fits the supposed crime -- or more accurately, trying to find a crime that meets their desire to see someone punished for a bunch of (mostly) consensual behavior.

Filed Under: child porn, law enforcement, police, sexting, teenagers

Prosecutors In 'Sexting' Case Apparently Obtained Search Warrant To Photograph Teen's Penis

from the combating-child-porn-by-creating-forced-child-porn dept

Julian Sanchez alerts us to a crazy story in the Washington Post (which, it should be noted, appears to be sourced from one side of the case, so recognize the potential bias), accusing prosecutors in a "sexting" child porn case of going so far as to get a search warrant to take a photograph of the defendant's "erect penis" in order to compare it to the one in a video he sent his girlfriend.

A Manassas City teenager accused of “sexting” a video to his girlfriend is now facing a search warrant in which Manassas City police and Prince William County prosecutors want to take a photo of his erect penis, possibly forcing the teen to become erect by taking him to a hospital and giving him an injection, the teen’s lawyers said

Like many other similar cases, this involves two teenagers sexting each other. We can all admit that this is a rather stupid thing to do, but it would be crazy not to recognize that this happens quite frequently with teens these days. It's already a pretty big stretch to try to twist those cases into "child porn" cases, but various prosecutors have been doing exactly that for years now. In this case, the 15-year-old girlfriend sent her 17-year-old boyfriend a photo of herself, and he sent back the video. The mother of the girl complained, and prosecutors went after the boy for "two felony charges, for possession of child pornography and manufacturing child pornography."

If that already seems fairly questionable, prosecutors apparently decided to take things to the next level when the boy refused to plead guilty:

The male teen was served with petitions from juvenile court in early February, and not arrested, but when the case went to trial in juvenile court in June, Foster said prosecutors forgot to certify that the teen was a juvenile. The case was dismissed, but police immediately obtained new charges and also a search warrant for his home. Police also arrested the teen and took him to juvenile jail, where Foster said they took photos of the teen’s genitals against his will.

The case was set for trial on July 1, where Foster said Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Claiborne Richardson told her that her client must either plead guilty or police would obtain another search warrant “for pictures of his erect penis,” for comparison to the evidence from the teen’s cell phone. Foster asked how that would be accomplished and was told that “we just take him down to the hospital, give him a shot and then take the pictures that we need.”

The teen declined to plead guilty. Foster said the prosecutor then requested a continuance so police could get a search warrant, which was granted by substitute Juvenile Court Judge Jan Roltsch-Anoll.

So, if you're keeping score at home, what we have is (1) two teens (stupidly, but not that surprisingly) sending each other revealing photos/videos of each other in a consenting manner that could be seen as "child porn" solely based on their age and (2) law enforcement forcing the boy to create more such "child porn" in an effort to pressure him into pleading guilty to two felony child porn charges. How does that make any sense at all? Can anyone actually claim that the "forced" photo by police and the followup search warrant, with the plan to "inject" him in a hospital to photograph his erect penis, is somehow less problematic than the original sexting video?

Filed Under: child porn, manassas city, prince william county, prosecutors, search warrant, sexting

Virginia Prosecutor Educates Sexting Teens Rather Than Prosecuting Them

from the good-guys dept

When a moral panic really gets rolling, it often seems like there isn't enough inertia in the world to slow it down. It sure seemed that way to me when it came to "sexting", the term for people, often young folks who don't fully appreciate the consequences, sending around naked pictures of themselves or their friends. I think there might be a great many older folks who forget what it was like to be a kid and then couple that with a general fear of digital technologies and suddenly the sky is falling. That's how you end up with prosecutors who look to charge young people who engage in sexting under child pornography laws, despite the inherent ridiculousness of that situation.

Fortunately, there are indeed some smart people in government, such as Louisa County prosecutor Rusty McGuire of Virginia, who has decided against charging young people for sexting and instead do a bit of education.

According to reports from the Central Virginian and the Associated Press, an investigation by the county sheriff’s office uncovered more than 1,000 nude or sexually suggestive photos posted to Instagram accounts and shared between more than 100 teenagers in Louisa and surrounding counties. But unlike other teen sexting rings that have made national news—where sexters have been brought up on felony pornography charges or disciplined by their schools—Louisa has opted to respond to the scandalous headlines with a refreshing dose of common sense. Major Donald Lowe told the AP that although the Louisa County Sheriff’s Office is still scouring student cellphones for signs of nonconsensual sexual activity, which could result in criminal charges, most students involved won’t be prosecuted. “We said from the beginning that we’re not going to label everyone who participated in this a sex offender,” he said. “There’s no reason to destroy people’s lives and careers over this.”

Now, for those of you already getting your ire up for a rebuttal, the question should always be, "How is justice best served?" I would think the answer to that question should generally be to stop illicit or unwanted behavior while making sure everyone involved is impacted as beneficially as possible. That isn't done by prosecuting children who simply aren't capable of a full understanding of the consequences of their actions. Educating them on the law and the consequences, on the other hand, seems to do the job nicely. With that in mind, McGuire is actively engaging students on their turf.

Louisa schools are expanding programs to teach teenagers “the dangers of social media and how to make smart choices” and are launching a program for parents to help discuss the issue with their kids. McGuire “talks about the importance of not doing any [sexting] activities,” Straley told me. “If you put it out there, it doesn’t go away. Teenagers need to know that and understand that when they put it out there, they’re more or less saying that they’re OK with the world seeing this.”

This is called hitting the nail on the head. Instead of throwing the legal book at someone, you educate everyone. Share some stories about how these kinds of actions have had negative impacts, get parents involved on the issue, and meet kids on a level playing field where you openly and honestly discuss why this might not be such a good idea. Kids are kids and teenagers are going to be interested in sex, no matter what you do. But kids are also generally smarter than I think most of us adults give them credit for and they can grasp the true impact of these actions if someone takes the time to lay it out for them.

Meanwhile, no children are suddenly living with a sexual predator label for the rest of their lives. That's the best solution all around.

Filed Under: education, prosecution, prosecutor, sexting, teens, virginia

Court Rejects PA DAs Attempt To Charge Teens For Sexting Themselves

from the common-sense-prevails dept

About a year ago a prosecutor in Pennsylvania wanted to bring child porn charges against some teenage girls who had taken some "nude and seminude" photos of themselves with cameraphones and sent them to others. The case was complicated in that after school officials turned over the evidence to the district attorney, the DA's office told the girls that they could avoid charges if they agreed to a special afterschool "education program." Some of the girls refused, and the prosecutor tried to charge them. This raised an outcry from many who felt it was ridiculous to charge kids with child pornography for taking photos of themselves. The judges in the case blocked the prosecutor from filing charges, but rather than take the hint, the prosecutor tried again with an appeal.

It looks like that was a dead end too. The appeals court unanimously ruled against the DA and criticized them for their efforts to bring charges against these girls. This case won't necessarily directly apply to other similar cases -- as much of the reasoning had to do with the requirement to take this class and write an essay about why what they did was "wrong," which was judged to be compelled speech, violating the First Amendment. Furthermore, the fact that the lawsuit was seen as retaliating for not obeying the order to take the class was also problematic. So, it's likely we'll still see other cases involving "sexting," where teenagers are accused of creating child porn of themselves.

Filed Under: pennsylvania, sexting

Indiana Senators Rush To Put In Place Sexting Law When They Clearly Don't Understand Sexting

from the moral-panics! dept

One of the more recent "moral panics" that we've seen is around this concept of "sexting," where people (often youngsters who might not fully recognize the consequences of what they're doing) send either naked or at least revealing images of themselves to others. In the last year or so the press has written about it quite a bit, and while it seems like it's really just a situation that requires more education for kids to recognize what a bad idea this is, once you get a moral panic going, it's never long before politicians feel the need to "help deal with" the issue, "for the children," of course. Mark sends in the news that some politicians in Indiana have decided to tackle the issue with new legislation, though it's not at all clear that the state Senators debating the subject even understand what sexting means:

"Until some terrible tragedy happens where a child or teenager commits suicide because they have been bullied by e-mail, texting or sexting," said Rep. Sandra Blanton.

Bullied by sexting will lead to suicide? How? And how do you create a law to prevent that? Then there's the politician who wants to ban mobile phones in schools to deal with this issue:

"Keep them in lockers and not allow them in the classroom or on school property to do the sexting," Rep. Blanton said.

Really? The sexting happens on school property? If that's the case, then wouldn't the issue be public nudity -- for which I would imagine there are already laws -- rather than "sexting"? If he just means that the sending of these photos continues on school property, I'm not really sure how keeping the phones in lockers fixes anything. It just means those messages will be sent after school when there's even less supervision of what the kids are doing. I guess that's the head-in-the-sand approach to dealing with things, but I'm not sure how it helps any.

Certainly the issue of sexting is one worth educating kids about, so they recognize the dangers of passing on such photos which can quickly multiply and be spread further in amazingly embarrassing ways. But I don't see how any law helps the issue at all -- but plenty of ways laws can make things worse -- especially when the politicians writing and voting on the laws don't even seem to understand what the issue is beyond "sexting = bad!"

Filed Under: indiana, law, politicians, sexting

Prosecutors Still Want To Charge Girl Who Sent Naked Photo Of Herself For Child Porn

from the crime-and-punishment dept

You may recall last year that prosecutors in Pennsylvania wanted to charge some girls who had taken either nude or partially unclothed photos of themselves, and then sent them via their mobile phones, with "child porn" charges. This seems pretty ridiculous no matter how you look at it, and it was good that a judge temporarily blocked the prosecutor from moving forward. You would hope that this would give the prosecutor a chance to rethink this idea, and perhaps realize that it's beyond extreme.

Instead? The prosecutor is appealing the ruling and still wants to charge at least one girl with child porn charges. The ACLU is fighting back, not just for this particular girl, but apparently over the threats of felony charges on 16-girls, who were then forced to participate in a "re-education" class to avoid charges. I have no problem with children being educated about why such things are really bad ideas, but to threaten them with felony charges, especially when even the mothers of one of the girls says that photos were just some girls goofing around, and in most cases no worse than what you'd find it a typical Victoria's Secret catalog? That seems like a prosecutor going too far.

Filed Under: pennsylvania, sexting

Is Casio Aiming For The Sexter Market With Its Latest Phone?

from the serious-questions dept

"Sexting," or kids taking nude or provocative photos of themselves and sending them around, is one of the moral panics du jour. While some people are working themselves into a lather over it, one can't help but wonder if Casio is trying to pitch its latest mobile handset to the teen sexter market with a couple of YouTube videos called "Sexy girl in the shower" and "Money shot." The videos have since been yanked, but the former touted the handset's waterproofing and 5-megapixel camera by showing -- no prizes for guessing -- a girl using it in the shower to talk and take a photo of herself. We won't get in to the content of the second ad, but suffice to say it's not something very many companies would be too comfortable with. Sure, showing somebody using a phone in the shower sounds like a great way to promote a waterproof handset, but given the sexting uproar, perhaps Casio's timing (and/or judgment) was a little off.

Filed Under: advertising, mistargeted, sexting

When Does It Stop Being 'Sexting' And Start Being Something More Serious?

from the gray-areas dept

The debate about "sexting" rages on, both here at Techdirt and elsewhere. One of the major points of contention has been that child-pornography laws don't make any distinction about who creates child porn, meaning that kids who take nude photos of themselves and send them out can be viewed in the same way -- in the eyes of the law -- as child pornographers who abuse and exploit children for commercial gain or personal titillation. The catch is that "the eyes of the law" are really the eyes of human prosecutors, who hopefully should realize that charging kids with child-porn offenses is an overreaction. CNN's got a story touching on this issue, but they didn't find a particularly good example: instead of talking about kids who took pictures of themselves, they lead with the story of an 18-year-old guy who sent out a nude picture of his 16-year-old girlfriend to "dozens" of friends and family after they'd had a fight. The guy was subsequently prosecuted under child-porn laws and has had to register as a sex offender. While it's clear the guy wasn't a commercial porn producer, it's also clear that he went a lot further than teens who take photos of themselves, send them out, and then find themselves in hot water. His actions, while caused by a moment of stupidity, were intended to hurt his girlfriend -- much different than teens taking and sending photos of themselves as an expression of their sexuality. To compare the two seems pretty disingenuous, and it's hard to imagine the guy will attract a whole lot of sympathy, but the story does illustrate the very black-and-white world of child porn laws, and how they can be applied with little distinction (or perhaps common sense) by some prosecutors.

Meanwhile, over at the WSJ, the "Numbers Guy", Carl Bialik, has taken a look at the survey that has been widely cited in sexting stories, claiming that 20 percent of teens have taken and sent nude photos of themselves. Bialik points out that the survey was conducted online, calling into question just how representative of the wider teen population the sample was. To ask teens about their online behavior, but only ask teens who are online, seems suspect. But hey, the stat sells the story, right?

Filed Under: porn, sexting

Judge Blocks Charges In Pennsylvania Sexting Case

from the where's-the-porn? dept

We've had a tremendous response in the comments to our previous posts regarding the "sexting" case in Pennsylvania, where a local prosecutor had threatened to bring child porn charges against some girls who'd taken some photos of themselves, topless and in underwear, and sent them to some boys. Last week, three of the girls sued the prosecutor with the help of the ACLU, and a federal judge has put a temporary restraining order on the prosecutor, preventing him from filing charges, while the lawsuit proceeds. While not making any sort of final, binding judgment, the judge said that the girls' contention that the photos -- which reportedly show the two girls in their bras, and one topless with a towel around her waist -- "do not appear to qualify in any way as depictions of prohibited sexual acts" was a reasonable one. That's potentially a big distinction: there's been a persistent line of argument in the comments on the earlier posts that child pornography laws don't allow any wiggle room, no matter how young the producer, or if they're taking pictures or videos of themselves. But if the images in question aren't even considered pornographic under the law, it would certainly appear that the prosecutor doesn't have much to stand on.

Filed Under: pennsylvania, sexting