Legal Research

Federal court looks at if all ?sexting? is child porn

By scott

An interesting case is being heard by the US Federal Appeal Court today. Miller v. Skumanick looks the address the issue of whether child porn charges can be brought against teenagers who send nude or semi-nude photos to each other ( ’sexting’ ). The case stems from action by ex Wyoming County District Attorney George Skumanick Jr against a group of teens, where he threatened to charge them with child porn offenses and place them on the sex offender register if they refused to take a class he had designed to educate youths about the dangers of sexting. Three parents refused to submit their children to the class and argued that Skumanick had violated their First Amendment rights with his threat of a child porn prosecution.

The Court has already issued a temporary restraining order in the case that will be watched closely across the US. The Court is essentially being asked to decide whether or not sexting images can be deemed child porn or not under Pennsylvania law ? and it seems unlikely they will be - the images in this case included a snap of a girl in her bikini, one of two girls posing in opaque white bras, and a girl wrapped in aN opaque white towel with her breasts showing.

It obviously seems stupid and counterproductive to be charging 13 year old girls (and boys) with child porn offences for sending nude and semi-nude photos to one another, however if (and when) these pics make it onto the wider internet and are viewed and or downloaded by others, then things invariably start to change. Although here too most child porn laws exist primarily to protect the ‘victims’ of the crime (although several countries have also expanded their laws to catch fake/virtual child porn as well) and if we accept that those sexting images of themselves are not victims, where does that leave the law in that regard?

I should say that I’m not, for one minute. suggesting that we get rid of our child porn laws, but new technology does throw up issues that demand serious debate regarding just how we interpret them. Is this a case of CHILD PORN: ‘I know it when I see it’? Can the image be classed as not being child porn when swapped between teenagers but then become child porn when viewed by third parties on the wider web?

A case worth following.

Full post as published by Information Overload on January 15, 2010 (boomark / email).