High School QB Charged Over Naked Pics ... of Himself

[Dave-W]

This is a crazy law. Any politician who doesn't think this should be changed isn't worthy of any respect.

Welcome to the wonderful bowl of worms that is the US legal system.

 

[Dave-W]

If you discount self taken pictures you have discounted the whole area where kids get pressured into taking such pictures.

And distributing them. That way the kiddy inappropriate content pushers would be off the hook.

 

[dgiharris]

I'm not so sure it is the politicians who are the problem. Well unless you count the local district attorney as a politician. He does not have to prosecute. Police and DAs are supposed to use some judgment. If they don't it is almost impossible to write laws to get the bad people and not get some innocent people in the process.

I think of the US legal system as a giant bully. They like easy targets and they like ruining lives over any perceived slight to their authority or if you don't give them the proper respect.

DAs can be attention hores and they love getting their photos and names in the press and this case allows for both.

Cases like these just make me so ashamed of my country. The Powers That Be that run this country have lost their darn mind.

 

[KitKatMatt]

I don't think they should be charged, but I do find some sense in the law.

If you're underage and take a nude picture of yourself, what you have on your phone or camera is a naked minor. That is child inappropriate contentography. If an underage person sends you a naked picture, that is distribution of child inappropriate contentography. Don't do it.

I think proper action would be taking possession of all computers/phones/etc that both of these teens have and deleting all of the image data related to the nudes so they can't be recovered, and explaining to them the reason for the law.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

I don't think they should be charged, but I do find some sense in the law.

If you're underage and take a nude picture of yourself, what you have on your phone or camera is a naked minor. That is child inappropriate contentography. If an underage person sends you a naked picture, that is distribution of child inappropriate contentography. Don't do it.

I think proper action would be taking possession of all computers/phones/etc that both of these teens have and deleting all of the image data related to the nudes so they can't be recovered, and explaining to them the reason for the law.

I'm 17 and really dislike the notion that photos of myself constitutes child inappropriate contentography. I'm a painter and took a series of semi-nude photos of myself when I was working on an art project at school about the human form. I cropped the profile picture I'm using here, but you can faintly make out that on the wall behind me there are nude figures. It's still hanging in the art gallery at my school, and it isn't viewed subversive or scandalous. You cannot tell the ages or identities of the nudes, but if you looked through my inspiration folder I made (I have one for most of my paintings) you could. In addition to the photos I created for the paintings, I've taken numerous ones of myself over the years - mainly partially nude but sometimes fully - simply out of curiosity and to chronicle myself and my own metamorphosis. I've had multiple surgeries over the years, and photos catalogue the healing process from huge angry scars to faded ones. Due to endocrine diseases my weight has fluctuated from 72 in 2011 to 112 pounds at graduation. I never have and never will upload or display any of those photos. If someone went combing through my laptop they could find the folder tucked away containing them. I don't know how the pictures of the teens the OP is about were discovered if they were simply on one another's phones, though admittedly I haven't done much reading about the situation. My photos are fundamentally different from a teen taking nude selfies and sexting, but yet under the law could technically be treated the same.

I realize that laws protecting minors need to include provisions for protecting minors from themselves, but there needs to be sensibility with it. A seventeen-year-old who manipulates seven and eight-year-olds into posing nude, and distributes those photos on pedophile sites has created a heinous and serious moral and legal crime. A 17-year-old who maliciously distributes nude photos of another 17-year-old to humiliate and harass him or her has also committed a crime. I don't think that merely being in possession of photos of yourself should be a crime.

 

[KitKatMatt]

I'm 17 and really dislike the notion that photos of myself constitutes child inappropriate contentography.

It doesn't matter if you don't like it, as long as you are under 18 nude or sexually explicit photos constitute child inappropriate contentography.

I didn't advocate for people to have their computers confiscated to see if they had pictures of themselves, just that in this case it might be the best (because they had sent them to each other, which is distribution). This situation isn't clear and easy to deal with, it's murky and conflicting. I don't see much wrong with a person having pictures of themselves privately and never sharing them, but when you send them it counts as distribution so that's why I think the photos between these two people should be erased.

Also, AFIAK, drawings/paintings of nude/sexually explicit minors are in a confusing legal state in the USA where they might or might not be legal. This also includes things that are heavily "based" on a person or character who is underage.

Those are murky waters to tread. Be careful.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

It doesn't matter if you don't like it, as long as you are under 18 nude or sexually explicit photos constitute child inappropriate contentography.

I didn't advocate for people to have their computers confiscated to see if they had pictures of themselves, just that in this case it might be the best (because they had sent them to each other, which is distribution). This situation isn't clear and easy to deal with, it's murky and conflicting. I don't see much wrong with a person having pictures of themselves privately and never sharing them, but when you send them it counts as distribution so that's why I think the photos between these two people should be erased.

Also, AFIAK, drawings/paintings of nude/sexually explicit minors are in a confusing legal state in the USA where they might or might not be legal. This also includes things that are heavily "based" on a person or character who is underage.

Those are murky waters to tread. Be careful.

I definitely realize that my agreement or feelings regarding a law are irrelevant to my obligation to abide it or face consequences. I was simply expressing my own thoughts.

As for my art, my mom and stepdad are attorneys so if they felt like anything I've created would place me in my legal jeopardy they would certainly take action to protect me from my own actions. In none of my paintings are the people who partially inspired them or their ages identifiable. I don't typically depict nudes, but that was actually part of the AP Art requirements.

If you went through my computer, hunted down my password-protected folder, and cracked it, you could find the pictures of myself from ages 13 through now. My parents don't know about that because it's private.

 

[ChristsSoldier115]

I really loathe nanny state laws. This one is just another on the list. God forbid the government lets the people govern themselves.

 

[Paradoxum]

I don't think they should be charged, but I do find some sense in the law.

If you're underage and take a nude picture of yourself, what you have on your phone or camera is a naked minor. That is child inappropriate contentography. If an underage person sends you a naked picture, that is distribution of child inappropriate contentography. Don't do it.

I wouldn't say there is anything inherently wrong about child inappropriate contentography, under your definition. As a general rule, it isn't wrong to have a picture of a naked minor on your phone. It's wrong in some circumstances.

Your statement doesn't show you know why child inappropriate content is bad (though I suspect you do really know). The problem with child inappropriate content isn't that child inappropriate content is arbitrarily bad, it's the exploitation and abuse on children.

But if nude underage pictures are self-taken and fully consensually, there is no exploitation or abuse, and so no wrong.

I'm kind of surprised you'd think a concept is wrong, even without harm, violation or exploitation. To me that is authoritarian oppression. You're generally pretty liberal and fair.

(I mean this post in a nice way, not accusatory. I like you.)

 

[Paradoxum]

My bet is this situation is NOT because of this one law, it is a rogue DA taking another law that allows for trying minors as adults and applying it here. A separate law somewhere in several thousand pages of laws.

If that's the case the DA deserves things I shouldn't publicly advocate.

 

[Paradoxum]

It doesn't matter if you don't like it, as long as you are under 18 nude or sexually explicit photos constitute child inappropriate contentography.

But it shouldn't. It's as stupid as surgery being call assault. If it's consensual it isn't a crime.

 

[rambot]

Lower the ages of the kids by 4 years. Would we all be reacting the exact same way?
It was your daughter in the pictures this guy took (who was then showing them around). Would you be reacting the same way?

 

[KitKatMatt]

I wouldn't say there is anything inherently wrong about child inappropriate contentography, under your definition. As a general rule, it isn't wrong to have a picture of a naked minor on your phone. It's wrong in some circumstances.

Your statement doesn't show you know why child inappropriate content is bad (though I suspect you do really know). The problem with child inappropriate content isn't that child inappropriate content is arbitrarily bad, it's the exploitation and abuse on children.

But if nude underage pictures are self-taken and fully consensually, there is no exploitation or abuse, and so no wrong.

I'm kind of surprised you'd think a concept is wrong, even without harm, violation or exploitation. To me that is authoritarian oppression. You're generally pretty liberal and fair.

(I mean this post in a nice way, not accusatory. I like you.)

You make good points. I think I don't see this issue perfectly due to the reasons for the laws, and how murky this subject tends to be.

It's really tough to get my head around.

I want to add though, the danger that other people get put in regarding other people's (underaged) nudes. There are issues on Tumblr with underaged people posting nudes in certain tags. What happens to me if I see these things? Can I get prosecuted for them? I'm in my 20's, and as far as I know prosecution for adults involved with these images is cutthroat. I don't want to be labeled as a sex offender or imprisoned because of someone else's choice!

If the laws were changed in any way that does not hurt those who are coerced or exploited by this but allows freedom for those who do so willingly and immunity for those who see them, I might feel different. For now, though, if someone has nudes of themselves taken when they were underaged, I want them to keep those to themselves!

 

[keith99]

Lower the ages of the kids by 4 years. Would we all be reacting the exact same way?
It was your daughter in the pictures this guy took (who was then showing them around). Would you be reacting the same way?

Source for either of the claims you just made?

 

[Ada Lovelace]

Lower the ages of the kids by 4 years. Would we all be reacting the exact same way?
It was your daughter in the pictures this guy took (who was then showing them around). Would you be reacting the same way?

Four years is a significant length of time in childhood and adolescence, with substantial differences in physical and cognitive development and maturity. As a visual aid you can compare this picture of shared of myself from four years ago here with photos from this year here. I'm already in college and identify as an adult now; back then I was a pubescent kid. There are important legal distinctions between a 17-year-old and a 13-year-old, too. I believe the youngest age of consent in the United States is 16. It's only in a minority of states that the age of consent is 18; in most it is 16 or 17. The sexual exploitation or assault of a minor under the age of 14 is also a more serious offense.

In this article it states that the police discovered the photos of 17-year-old Cormega Copening with his then 16-year-old girlfriend on his cell phone while investigating an unrelated claim of sexting at his school last October. The pictures were not uploaded to the internet or shown to anyone else. Ethically it would have been a very different situation if he had sent the photos of himself to others to harass them, or had sent photos of her without her permission to humiliate her, but that's not what happened.

Copening faced up to 10 years in prison after police say they discovered nude images of himself. He was 16 at the time he took the pictures with his then 16-year-old girlfriend.

The police discovered the photos on his cell phone while investigating an unrelated claim of sexting at his school last October.

Neither Copening nor the young woman shared the photos further, but authorities are charging the pair as adults because they are now 17.

They are charged with multiple counts of making and possessing images of their under aged 16-year-old selves, making each of them both the predator and the victim.

The young woman took a plea deal in July, and earlier this month, Copening's lawyer began fighting for the charges to be reduced, saving the teen from prison time and pushing for his name to be taken off the sex offender registry.

Cormega and the girl have been ordered to do 30 hours of community services and will not be allowed to have a cell phone for a year.

If they comply, their records will be wiped clean.

http://abc7ny.com/news/teen-facing-...es-for-self-sexting-accepts-plea-deal/994778/

 

[rambot]

It was jus an exercise. That's all.

 

[classicalhero]

Source for either of the claims you just made?

Do you understand hypotheticals?

 

[PreachersWife2004]

and what happens when one of them breaks up with the other, and suddenly there are nude photos of them all over the place?

Taking nude pictures with your phone is stupid no matter what your age. (and no, we're not talking about "art")

 

[Ada Lovelace]

and what happens when one of them breaks up with the other, and suddenly there are nude photos of them all over the place?

Taking nude pictures with your phone is stupid no matter what your age. (and no, we're not talking about "art")

Why cast of net of aspersion over their character? It feels really cynical to me to speculate that if they broke up they'd distribute the private photos of one another all over the place. Many teenage couples have ended their relationships amicably, and even most of those who do have animosity towards one another wouldn't be so vengeful, malicious, and destructive as to send out nude photos. That's an especially devious and unethical violation. That's also assuming they're too stupid to realize the serious legal and social repercussions they'd face for their own actions. Sure some would do that, but most would not and have not.

The photos were on his private phone. They are not accused of having uploaded them or shared them with anyone else. The police were at his school investigating a sexting matter that was not relating to him, and when he cooperatively handed over his own phone they discovered the pictures. Sure, he should have removed them from his phone. To me the proportional and appropriate reaction would have been to simply talk with the two of them about the photos, confirm their ages and that the photos were consensual, and have the photos removed from the camera. The charges against him defy reason.

People have been taking nude photos of themselves since the invention of the camera. The only difference is that technology has now changed. Of course that change in technology mandates that far more caution be used, but it doesn't change the innocence of the action itself or warrant the ludicrous reaction.

 

[PreachersWife2004]

Yep, it's cynical. It's also reality. Breakups aren't generally amicable, and kudos to those who can pull them off. I personally feel that a young couple sharing naked photos of each other through their phones aren't destined for the long haul, and I personally believe that most of those types of relationships end badly. Stories like THIS are actually far too common.

Yes, people have been taking nude pictures since cameras were around. It's still stupid.

My oldest, who is now 20, understood what it could mean to have naked pictures of himself or his girlfriend on his phone.

And private doesn't mean anything when it comes to minors.