Court Rules That Sexting Teens Aren’t Felons
March 19, 2010 · Print This Article
Filed under: Cell Phones, Cameras
After a teenage girl from Pennsylvania was caught sending topless pics of herself to her fellow classmates, then-District Attorney George Skumanick offered her the opportunity to avoid court time by taking a class on sexual harassment. When the 16-year old called his bluff, Skumanick threatened her with felony charges. The student, in turn, filed her own lawsuit against the D.A.’s office, eventually becoming the first-ever sexting criminal case to make its way all the way up to a federal appeals court. On Wednesday, the Third U.S. District Court of Appeals finally ruled in her favor, deciding that teenagers involved in sexting criminal cases cannot be charged as felons.
According to the court, the D.A.’s attempt to force the student to take a class and write an essay on the social ills of sexting directly violated her constitutional right to be free from compelled speech, and unnecessarily infringed on her parents’ rights to direct their child’s upbringing. The court also interpreted Skumanick’s felony threats as “retaliation” against the girl for refusing to participate in the course. Witold Walczack, the legal director of the Pennsylvania ACLU, was understandably satisfied with the decision, calling it an “important message for prosecutors… that there are constitutional limits on their ability to bring criminal charges against kids involved in sexting.” Current Wyoming County D.A. Jeff Mitchell, on the other hand, was a bit more disappointed, saying, “[The] decision appears to limit the discretion a district attorney has when faced with a criminal case, or a juvenile case.”
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Court Rules That Sexting Teens Aren’t Felons originally appeared on Switched on Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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