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posted by on Wednesday March 22 2017, @08:19AM   Printer-friendly
from the better-treatment-than-if-he's-guilty dept.

On Monday, a US federal appeals court sided against a former Philadelphia police officer who has been in jail 17 months because he invoked his Fifth Amendment right against compelled self-incrimination. He had refused to comply with a court order commanding him to unlock two hard drives the authorities say contain child porn.

The 3-0 decision (PDF) by the 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals means that the suspect, Francis Rawls, likely will remain jailed indefinitely or until the order (PDF) finding him in contempt of court is lifted or overturned. However, he still can comply with the order and unlock two FileVault encrypted drives connected to his Apple Mac Pro. Using a warrant, authorities seized those drives from his residence in 2015. While Rawls could get out from under the contempt order by unlocking those drives, doing so might expose him to other legal troubles.

In deciding against Rawls, the court of appeals found that the constitutional rights against being compelled to testify against oneself were not being breached. That's because the appeals court, like the police, agreed that the presence of child porn on his drives was a "foregone conclusion." The Fifth Amendment, at its most basic level, protects suspects from being forced to disclose incriminating evidence. In this instance, however, the authorities said they already know there's child porn on the drives, so Rawls' constitutional rights aren't compromised.

[...] The suspect's attorney, Federal Public Defender Keith Donoghue, was disappointed by the ruling.

"The fact remains that the government has not brought charges," Donoghue said in a telephone interview. "Our client has now been in custody for almost 18 months based on his assertion of his Fifth Amendment right against compelled self-incrimination."

-- submitted from IRC


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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @11:52AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @11:52AM (#482663)

    When Denmark legalized porn back in the 1970'es, rape statistics went down significantly. Which shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who realizes that 1) people are lazy, 2) jerking to porn is easy and 3) getting away with rape is a lot of work.

    Any logical thinking person should come to the conclusion that the same applies to child porn.

    But what about production? Well here it gets a bit more complicated, as we need to involve the concept of supply and demand. The demand is pretty much constant, we haven't found a cure for pedophilia yet. What we are currently doing is reducing supply, which any economist will tell you drives prices UP, which in turn increases the incentive to produce more.

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  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @12:39PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @12:39PM (#482675)

    You can't handwave away production as, 'well that gets a bit more complicated.' This sort of stuff destroys the victims involved and there is literally no way for them to consent. I'm fine with people having animated or other sorts of images that involve no actual people, but there is simply no way to do this with real people without causing serious damage to a person. I tend to be extremely liberal on social matters with the little clause at the end that one person's freedom ends where harm to another begins.

    • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday March 22 2017, @04:01PM

      by tangomargarine (667) on Wednesday March 22 2017, @04:01PM (#482793)

      This sort of stuff destroys the victims involved

      Because working in the regular porn industry is always such a barrel of monkeys anyway.

      I doubt GP was attempting to be glib. How one defines "child" is part of the problem. Girls apparently mature faster than boys, and 17 years 364 days is still considered child porn?

      --
      "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @06:28PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 22 2017, @06:28PM (#482875)

    Move to Hollywood, apparently child actors do a bit more than just simply act..

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 25 2017, @12:16PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 25 2017, @12:16PM (#484080)

    You have a correlation in denmark. Good. I have average life expectancy of a porn star being only 37. What would this mean for children? Fap to 3d porn instead.