The same cannot be said for those who created the Dropbox folders through which those photos were collected and shared and those who shared photos through use of an access code.
KY3 is reporting that the Joplin Police Department has sent a search warrant to serve on Dropbox:
No arrests have been made, but the Cyber Crime Task Force based in Joplin is only beginning their investigation.
Police are sending a search warrant to Dropbox so they can stop further access to the images and determine whether any minor students are indeed depicted in the photos. If so, the parents of all involved will be notified and a prosecutor will determine if any child porn laws have been violated.
"You know I don't think the intent of the law was to punish juveniles for being juveniles, I think the intent of child pornography law is for adults that are preying upon children," says Corporal Chuck Niess of the Joplin Police Department.
Niess says while it is unlikely anyone would be prosecuted for taking a nude selfie, there could be charges against those who took or shared images of anyone under 18.
"That's all part of the investigation, to determine the ages of the people involved, what's actually been done, who sent what to who, and things like that," says Niess.
3 comments:
Sixty girls sent nude selfies and never suspected the recipient might share the pictures. I don't think so. There may have been some girls naive enough to believe their photos wouldn't be shared but I seriously doubt the majority of the girls didn't know. Taking the nude pics and sending them to someone was stupid. Thinking the guy they sent the picture to was going to just keep it for his own viewing pleasure is laughable.
Based upon the limited information reported so far, I don't believe any of them should be labeled as sex offenders. But, all of these kids are starting down a slippery slope and there has to be some serious consequences for their actions. If not, there is no reason for them to stop this behavior and the inevitable criminal charges have simply been delayed for a few years.
Whether the students involved are 18 or younger shouldn't matter. The consequences should be the same if they are all high school students who haven't been out in the "real world" yet and are all behaving with about the same level of experience of what is acceptable behavior. Turning 18 doesn't magically turn someone into an adult.
Ugh!!! To 11:28, the girls did not send these pictures to one or two people all at once!! Some of these pictures are more than 3 years old!! My daughter sent a picture (not nude) to one of these boys that was her boyfriend at the time TWO years ago. That picture is one of them on the dropbox. This dropbox has been in existence for some time and the photos were compiled by SEVERAL boys over a very long period of time. In fact, that boyfriend doesn't even live in Missouri anymore but had shared the picture with one of his friends who saved it, among many others he had collected and has since added it to this dropbox account. There is more to this story!!!
To 12:26: I'm sure there is MUCH more to the story. I wasn't under the impression that there was only one recipient or that it happened over a short period of time. I didn't mean to imply there were no innocent victims here. Maybe your daughter was one of the girls who naively believed her "boyfriend at the time" wouldn't share her picture. I'm sorry for her and and others in her position. I still doubt that was the case with most of them.
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