Two Fort Myers Teens Reportedly Among Victims of National Child Porn Ring
In mid-March, the Department of Homeland security announced that it had arrested 14 men across the nation for running a child pornography website which contained videos of hundreds of teenage boys in a sting called “Operation Round Table”. According to law enforcement, 26-year-old Jonathan Johnson posed as a teenage girl on various social networking sites on coerced teen boys into sending sexually explicit videos to him. These videos were then placed on a hidden porn website which was set up in such a way where the people accessing these videos were not easily traceable. Johnson eventually recruited other men in to getting videos for the site in the same manner. Among the victims are two teenage boys from Fort Meyers, 13 and 15 years old. Some of the victims in the case were as young as three, but most were between 13 and 17 years old. The website had over 27,000 members and more than 2000 different videos. The victims appeared not to know that they were made part of a child porn website.
Many of the children who were featured on this website did not know they were on it because they believed that the videos that they made were sent to other teenagers through social media. Sexting, meaning sending someone sexually explicit pictures or video, has become increasingly common among teens in recent years. One poll done in 2008 by The National Campaign shows that up to 21% of teen girls and 18% of teen boys have sent or posted sexually explicit pictures of themselves. 15% of those teens sent pictures to someone that they only knew online, such as in this case.
There are many social and safety reasons why teens should not post or send sexually explicit pictures of themselves. One of the most important reasons why they should not do this is because of this very result – they could end up on a website someplace and not even know it. Besides child pornography sites, there are also “revenge porn” sites that are specifically set up for posting these pictures on a public forum, sometimes with personal information.
There are legal issues involed with teens sending and receiving sexually explicit or nude photos as well, mainly because it could open them up to child pornography charges. Florida has eased the penalties for sexting, but there could still be a fine or community service involved for a first offense. However, if it keeps happening, there could be harsher penalties, even a felony charge. That, however, is only the case for pictures sent and received in Florida. Every state law is different and could end up having a different result. Meaning that the wisest thing to do is just to not send the picture or video in the first place.
In many of these cases, the law is still catching up with the reality of what goes on among young people. Only a few states have laws on the books that forbid posting on revenge porn sites when the victim is over 18. Others don’t differentiate between sexting between teens and one pedophile sending child porn to another and will sentence accordingly, including making a teen register as a sex offender. There are ways to get images taken off of websites using copyright claims for teens over 18, but in reality, once a picture is posted online, it can remain there forever.
