The Child Protection eNewsletter

California’s “Pedophile Protection Act”…
California’s Senate Bill 1313 (SB1313), dubbed “The Pedophile Protection Act” by its critics, has been passed by both houses of the California state legislature and is sitting on Governor Schwarzenegger’s desk for signature. http://tinyurl.com/6dqkj Under current California law, persons who regularly come in contact with children are required to report known or suspected physical or sexual abuse of children. The act would remove that requirement in many instances. The issue came to the forefront when it was discovered that Planned Parenthood had seen over 30,000 children, including some under the age of six for sexually transmitted diseases, without reporting even one instance of suspected abuse. For more information on what you can do to stop this bill from becoming law, visit Dr. Laura Schlessinger’s Action Center at http://tinyurl.com/6sd23. To read the actual bill, visit http://tinyurl.com/43724. The Governor may sign or veto this bill at any time. To email Governor Schwarzenegger visit http://tinyurl.com/3subc.

Court nixes Pa’s online child porn law…
A federal judge overturned a landmark Pennsylvania law that required Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) to block internet sites that the State Attorney General determined contained illegal child pornography. http://tinyurl.com/6ennz and http://tinyurl.com/6b2bm The judge’s 109 page opinion http://tinyurl.com/6ennz claims, among other things, that the technology used to block such sites is “too clumsy” to not also block other legitimate sites, that the statute did not allow for a constitutionally required hearing or appeal prior to blocking a website, and that the interstate commerce clause would restrict the state’s ability to regulate content not contained within its borders. The judge claims 1,000,000 legitimate websites were blocked in an effort to block 400 that the state had attempted to shut down.

In other news…
There is some mixed news on teens’ drug use. A new survey shows that marijuana and LSD use is down, but prescription drug abuse is rising among teens. http://tinyurl.com/63pku

A Wisconsin man wanted on a domestic abuse charge threw his fiancée’s eight-month-old baby out of a car during a police chase. http://tinyurl.com/4o64e Prior to slowing down to toss the baby, car seat and all, onto the highway, the chase had exceeded 100 miles per hour. The man died following the crash with an unmanned police vehicle that ended the chase.

The State Department has elevated John Miller, Director of the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons (http://www.state.gov/g/tip/) to the rank of Ambassador. The State Department hopes the new title for Ambassador Miller will give the Office even more clout in the Bush Administration’s continued war against sexual slavery and trafficking in persons. For more on the campaign against trafficking in persons, see http://www.childprotectionprogram.org/newsletter/vol2_iss24.html, http://www.childprotectionprogram.org/newsletter/vol2_iss6.html , http://www.childprotectionprogram.org/newsletter/vol2_iss15.html, http://www.childprotectionprogram.org/newsletter/vol2_iss17.html, and http://www.childprotectionprogram.org/newsletter/vol2_iss18.html


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