The Child Protection eNewsletter

Supreme Court upholds anti-child pornography law…  

The Supreme Court has upheld criminal penalties for promoting child pornography.  Read More

The court, in a 7-2 decision, brushed aside concerns that the law could apply to mainstream movies that depict adolescent sex, classic literature or innocent e-mails that describe pictures of grandchildren.

The ruling upheld part of a 2003 law that also prohibits possession of child porn.  It replaced an earlier law against child pornography that the court struck down as unconstitutional.

The law sets a five-year mandatory prison term for promoting, or pandering, child porn.  It does not require that someone actually possess child pornography.  Opponents have said the law could apply to movies like "Traffic" or "Titanic" that depict adolescent sex.

But Justice Antonin Scalia, in his opinion for the court, said the law does not cover movie sex.  There is no "possibility that virtual child pornography or sex between youthful-looking adult actors might be covered by the term 'simulated sexual intercourse'." Scalia said.

Likewise, Scalia said, First Amendment protections do not apply to "offers to provide or requests to obtain child pornography."

The decision is available online at Read More.

Court hears FLDS custody cases… 

Court hearings in the historic Texas polygamist child custody case have resumed, with cases going on in five courtrooms.  Texas child welfare officials removed more than 400 children from a ranch owned by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in April.  Read More

The hearings are being held for parents to review documents called "family service plans" that dictate the conditions under which they can regain custody, lawyers said.

Two children of jailed "prophet" Warren Steed Jeffs are among the hundreds of children removed from the Yearning for Zion ranch in Eldorado, Texas by child welfare authorities, court officials said.  Jeffs is the leader and "prophet" of the 10,000-member sect, which openly practices polygamy.

Two mothers who had children with Jeffs—a boy and a 3-year-old girl—were in court Monday.  Both mothers were told that the children would stay in state custody as officials try to finish the family service plan.

Jeffs is serving time in Utah after his 2007 conviction for being an accomplice to rape—charges related to a marriage to a child bride that he performed in 2001.  vol5_iss65  He also faces trial in Arizona on eight charges of sexual conduct with a minor, incest and conspiracy.

While the recent raid on the FLDS ranch in Eldorado, Texas has thrust allegations of widespread child abuse at the polygamous sect into the national spotlight, one of the darkest secrets of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints unfolds at a seedy roadside motel in the remote Nevada desert, where underage girls—some as young as 14—are allegedly forced through hasty and secret wedding ceremonies.  Read More

Elissa Wall says she was one such 14-year-old who was taken to the motel and plunged into wedlock with no choice but to accept and obey the command of Jeffs.

Sam Brower, a private detective who has spent five years investigating Jeffs and his sect for a number of former members, says the weddings are done "covertly, real cloak-and-dagger like."

Wall, now 21, told ABC News' John Quinones that, "I was trapped.  I felt like I had nowhere to turn.  I did not want to go through with this marriage.  I felt, honestly, what it was like to die."  See video link:  Read More

In other news…  

A Prestonwood Baptist Church minister arrested for soliciting a minor online has resigned from the church, Pastor Jack Graham told his congregation.  Read More  Dr. Graham addressed the crowd at the start of the suburban Dallas church's regular worship service.  He said the church had accepted Joe Barron's resignation, which took effect immediately.  "You need to know that we are appalled and we are disgraced by this terrible action, an unacceptable action by a minister on our staff," Dr. Graham said.  "I'm so sorry for the injury that this kind of behavior has brought to many people in our church and outside of our church."  Police arrested Mr. Barron, 52, after he drove from Plano to Bryan to meet with what he thought was a 13-year-old girl he had met online, authorities say.  The girl turned out to be a Bryan police officer working in an ongoing Internet sex sting.

A Colorado teenager has been ordered to stand trial after a 7-year-old girl in his care died in what police said was a beating that imitated the "Mortal Kombat" video game.  Read More  A Weld County judge ruled there was enough evidence to warrant a trial for Lamar Roberts, 17, accused of child abuse resulting in the December 6 death of Zoe Garcia and child abuse resulting in serious injury.  A trial date will be set after a June 20 court hearing.  His girlfriend, Heather Trujillo, 16, Zoe's half-sister, is scheduled to stand trial July 7.  Both will be tried as adults.  Zoe died of blunt-force trauma to the head after she was hit, kicked and slammed to the floor as the teens reportedly re-enacted the video game, authorities have alleged.  The two were baby-sitting while the sisters' mother, Dana Trujillo, 30, was at work.

While her two children were allegedly left alone in the car, police say Jennifer Lee was busy playing the slots.  Read More  A father is arrested for leaving his kids inside a car while he gambled.  Lee and Fouchoy Saephan are both facing felony charges of willful cruelty to children, after allegedly leaving their children in a car for about 45 minutes while they were inside a California casino—where Lee allegedly spent part of the time gambling.  When they were discovered by Madera County sheriff's deputies, the children—a 2-year-old and a 10-month-old—"were crying, screaming, sweating profusely and their skin had turned reddish in color," sheriff's department spokeswoman Erica Stuart said.  Though there are no reliable statistics on how often gambling leads to the abuse or neglect of children, this is one of several recent cases of parents allegedly leaving their children unattended while they gambled.  See video link:  Read More.

The New York Times has a story on the woman in charge of tracking one small North Dakota town’s 20 registered sex offenders.  Read More  Dickinson, near the Badlands of western North Dakota, has nearly 16,000 people living within its 9.5 square miles.  And, like anywhere else, it has its share of registered sex offenders, working in the oil fields and at the drive-thru window, browsing at the Wal-Mart and in the Prairie Hills Mall, appearing prominently on local and state Web sites because they cannot be trusted around children.  In addition to being fingerprinted, photographed and swabbed for a DNA sample, they must register with local law enforcement officials within three days of moving into a community.  This includes providing home address, employer’s address, e-mail address and any information regarding motor vehicles, schools and “social networking.”  In the end, one person monitors the registered sex offenders of Dickinson:  Detective McNamee, 27, the wife of a night-shift supervisor at the Baker Boy plant and the mother of two children, one 19 months old, the other 4 months old.

Contrary to widespread belief, teenagers do not appear to commonly engage in oral sex as a way to preserve their virginity, according to the first study to examine the question nationally.  Read More  The analysis of a federal survey of more than 2,200 males and females aged 15 to 19 found that more than half reported having had oral sex.  But those who described themselves as virgins were far less likely to say they had tried it than those who have had intercourse.  "There's a popular perception that teens are engaging in serial oral sex as a strategy to avoid vaginal intercourse," said Rachel Jones of the Guttmacher Institute, a private, nonprofit research organization based in New York, who helped do the study.  "Our research suggests that's a misperception."  Instead, the study found that teens tend to become sexually active in many ways at about the same time.  For example, although only one in four teenage virgins had engaged in oral sex, within six months after their first intercourse more than four out of five adolescents reported having oral sex.  See the study at  Read More.

The Sacramento Bee takes a look at underage prostitutes marketed on the internet.  Read More  If she tried hard, 14-year-old Jasmine could have sex with nine men a day.  She'd start posting ads online at 2 or 3 p.m., in time to set up appointments with early commuters.  She'd finish by 5:30 a.m., exhausted and disgusted.  The money—about $100 per trick—went to whichever pimp was profiting from her lost innocence.  In September, Sacramento police Sergeant Pam Seyffert and her vice unit picked up Jasmine at a Good Nite Inn near California State University, Sacramento.  They'd found her the same way so many men had:  on craigslist.  For this report, The Bee interviewed three prostitutes, ages 14 and 15, along with experts, police officers and youth advocates. The newspaper is using pseudonyms for the girls because they are minors, and each girl is a victim of a sex crime.

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