#259 Apply Some Common Sense

Grandma Arrested for Child Porn because she took some film to Wal-Mart (mistake #1) to be processed. The film happened to be of her 3 year old grand daughter in and just getting out of a bath.

The charges were dropped a mere 15 months later.

I don't get where the distribution of child pornography charge comes from but the producing one kind of, sort of makes sense in bizarro, way-too-uptight world.

I get the underlying desire to protect children from sexual predation. I get that. But prosecuting a grandmother for taking cute pictures of her granddaughter does absolutely nothing to protect children. It makes criminals out of relatives.

The main issue in this case is that the application of the law is subjective. An uptight, closeted pervert DA sees porn where a normal person sees a cute kid. The law isn't supposed to be subjective, it is supposed to be objective, clear and easy to understand. But it isn't and that's why cases like this are so thorny.

I've blocked people on Flickr who have favorited photos of my children when they have no profile, no photos of their own and every single other photo they've favorited is of children. I'm not unsympathetic to the DA's mindset but there comes a time when common sense should dictate the intention behind a photo. Does he really think Grandma Dull was getting off on this picture? Maybe that's why he's gone into private practice, because he's a friggin' moron.

Rule #259 is Apply Some Common Sense