Charging Minors with Child Porn Options

[Comptine]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28679588/

There have been a lot of cases of police arresting and charging teenagers/minors with possession and distribution of child pornography because they've been sending racy pictures through their phones. Authorities argue these measures are done to send a message. They are protecting kids from further harming themselves by risking their pictures getting put on the internet. So a 14 year old girl who sends her boyfriend a naked picture of herself could get arrested and charged for distributing child porn.

However, once charged, these kids have to register as a sex offender, in some places for as long as ten years. Which means, that 14 year old girl will find it a lot harder to apply for jobs and college all because she sent a photo of herself to her boyfriend and got lumped into the same category as a child molester.

Thoughts?

[karmakiller]

^ Well, parents shouldn't get off completely free of anything. If their children do something that's against the law the parents are responsible too, because of negligence. I don't see how that wouldn't apply to this situation. And I agree with JC, if someone sending nudes to her boyfriend was considered breaking news I would never watch the news. That's more ridiculous than some of the stuff they report anyways.


I think I could understand someone under 18 being charged with something if his/her intent was to post the photo on the web or to send it to an adult. But even then, it should be the adult getting charged, not the child. Just because sending nudes to someone is in poor taste, doesn't mean it should require a child to register as a sex offender for 10 years. Children are naive, and I think that's a bit harsh. I'm not saying they should just let it go, though.