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Child porn law goes nuts: 14-year-old girl charged for nude selfie
A 14-year-old girl is facing charges in Minnesota juvenile courts that could lead to her being placed on a sex offender registry—all for taking a nude selfie and sending it to a boy at her school. Prosecutors say that she violated Minnesota's child pornography statute, which bans distributing sexually explicit pictures of underaged subjects. But a legal brief filed this week by the ACLU of Minnesota says that this is ridiculous. Charging a teenager for taking a nude selfie means the state is charging the supposed victim—an absurd result that the legislature can't have intended when it passed Minnesota's child pornography statute, the ACLU argues.
The case is being heard by a juvenile court in Rice County—about an hour south of the Twin Cities. Because this is juvenile court, there's a lot we don't know including the name of the teenager. We don't even know if the selfie in question was a photo or a video. What we do know comes from the ACLU's legal brief, which includes a brief description of the case. According to the ACLU, the anonymous teen sent a nude selfie to a classmate over Snapchat. The recipient apparently took a screenshot of the message and shared it with others at school without the girl's consent. One of the classmates alerted the police in Faribault, Minnesota, which is presumably where the girl goes to school.
Officials decided to charge the girl with the "felony sex offense of knowingly disseminating pornographic work involving a minor to another person." An adult convicted of this crime can face up to seven years in prison. As a 14-year-old, the girl in this case isn't facing a criminal prosecution in adult court and won't face the harsh sentence an adult might face. The problem, the ACLU notes, is that if she's found guilty she is likely to be placed on a sex offender registry, where she would face the same stigmas as someone who commits violent sex crimes. That could lead to difficulties finding a job or obtaining housing. The ACLU's brief doesn't mention whether the boy was charged for distributing the girl's photo to other classmates.
(Score: 2) by mmcmonster on Monday January 01 2018, @12:48PM (2 children)
One of the girls in the local middle school (grades 6-8) took a selfie in which she was topless and just wearing panties. She wrote after it 'Do you want some of this?' and sent it to several boys in her grade.
Of course this got to the principal who had the girl and her parents get counseling and brought in the boys and their parents and made sure they all understood how serious something like this could be.
No law enforcement was involved.
As you would expect in a case like this, all the school knew who the girl was within a week and the parents had to have her transfered elsewhere. The end result is that the girl may feel like her life was ruined but at least it's something she can (hopefully) get over in a year or two.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 01 2018, @02:14PM (1 child)
How serious that can be depends, frankly, on how diseased your mind is. I've been flashed titties irl (once by mistake, second by a ~10 yo girl who somehow thought it was a funny thing to do, with her parents present) and we just had a good laugh.
Just as you don't go grab a hamburger from someone's hand just because you are hungry and it looks yummy, you don't go bothering a girl just because she exposes some skin, no matter how attractive. What are you, animal or man?
Account abandoned.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 02 2018, @09:43AM
But they may not realize that might end up happening when they send a nude of themselves to someone else.
Yes it's a serious breach of trust by the recipient if they spread it, but the recipients are often kids who don't know better either.
But maybe that's where teachers and parents have to educate the kids - e.g. if you don't want random "creepy" people to masturbate to your nude pics don't send any.