MMy dad is in the exact same predicament. All child porn is a sting by the FBI. My dad has people who have used his computer n it is possible for anyones computer, firewalled and all, to be hacked in. My dad hasn't gone to trial yet, but a man doesn't startbout in his old age liking child porn. I will have to check to see if he had limewire. Thanks for the post. We are devastated.

Make sure he has a good attorney that has a back ground with this, we were told to take the plea or he would go to jail, we were terrfied and we did! His was also caught up in a sting with 10 other people and it did not matter if you had one video or thousands everyone got the same deal. Good look with his case and i will pray for you and your family as you go through this.

I could say so much about this subject (my son is serving 20 years for a shareware program) but honestly it just hurts too much and I don't wanna cry today.
There is a group in New York who are working to try and fight the CP laws: http://cautionclick.webs.com/
You might start there by joining the fight for an end to these insane and way too harsh laws. There are alot of really useful links on this page and off the link pages that are helpful.
If I can be any help, feel free to contact me.
Laurie

Laurie: Thank you so much for the information, I will check out the website. I have two young sons and want there dad to be able to do things when they have grandkids and in PA he has no restrictions, but we have family all over the midwest and we will never be able to move back there because of this, something needs to change with these laws, I have done a ton of research on why men do this and the bulk of them never have or intended to harm a child, how is it I know this but the law makers wont take the time to do this and would rather ruin peoples lives. It is a witch hunt, I never thought this could happen to us over a video, and now I know the legal system is not just!!!

Anything you find by Troy Stabenow is very informative and helpful. He has an entire report that is full of data. Here is a link to just one article that qoutes him and some of the stats.
http://columbiachronicle.com/discrepancy-in-sex-offender-sentencing/

The laws are so unfair. My son never touched anyone, nor would he have, yet his life was taken and our family's life was destroyed. I will fight until I don't have a single breath left in me to change these laws.
I wish you the very best of luck in your case. I am always here if you need anything.
Laurie

Christa, I also can relate to your predicament. My BF was on the internet looking at child porn in Dec 2009 and our life as we know it will never be the same again. At the time he was an alcoholic who had addictive tendencies that since have been under control. I guess we can attribute his sobriety to this nightmare. He was lucky to receive 5 years probation and thousands and thousands of dollars (like in the 20k) range in sex offender classes, fines, probation costs, and of course the good ol' ankle monitoring. He was already out of work and it seems even more difficult to even have someone even CONSIDER an application from someone with a felony- especially as a SO. We feel like our lives are forever destroyed. It is difficult and like you, I would like to speak out to the public on this scarlet letter and the complications that lie ahead with moving on. If you figure out how we can be the voices for the SO's out there I would be a part of it. Most of all, I just want my BF to not give up because the system is designed to suppress, suppress---- knock you down. It is not designed to help you.... Good Luck and keep your chin up. Hopefully, you have a great family and support network. : )

I can relate to your story. My husband is now serving in a military prison for CP. He intentionally downloaded it from frostwire & limewire though. They were teens & he was only 20. So it's sorta like a romeo+juliet thing. Anyways.. if you find out anything please do let us know. I've been doing all i can to find out ways to help our case. We're young and have 3 babies. The rest of our lives dealing w/ the RSO list and ridicule from people is just way too much for me to handle.
I hope you find all the help you're seeking. Try writing your state's government. I've gotten several letters from a governor about my fears and feelings about the RSO laws.

Dear everyone who has posted here thus far -- I am a member of the CautionClick group referenced in Laurie's post. I'm thrilled to see it referenced since it is a fairly new group and just adopted that name about 6 months ago. I joined this Daily Strength website just this week, but I lived in upstate NY until 3 weeks ago and have been an attending member of CautionClick for just under a year. Having found these two groups in the last year tells me a lot. When this calamity happened to me and my husband almost 4 years ago, I searched and searched for group support in vain. It took THREE years to find others in my position. I can tell you it was a very lonely period, knowing no one in my shoes. Finding these two groups means people are beginning to come out of hiding, realizing how unjust the system is, and are beginning to be willing to fight it. I certainly am.

If you are serious about fighting this stuff, the first most important thing we can do is educate ourselves. There is a great deal of anti-SO law that is finally being produced. Stabenow material is one good source. Material by psych Robert Weiss in L.A. is another great resource. His website is: http://www.sexualrecovery.com/. He also has a very good video for spouses of sex addicts at http://www.vimeo.com/10241385. I HIGHLY recommend: "Justice Perverted" by Charles Patrick Ewing, an attorney and forensic psychologist out of SUNY, Buffalo. His book just came out this year so the only way to get it is to pay full price, but very worth it. Lastly I suggest looking up Nevada therapist Steven Ing on YouTube. He has excellent and hopeful short videos about sex offenders and treatment and public policy.

The 2nd most important thing we can do, after educating ourselves, is to be a part of one of these grassroots coalitions, like CautionClick. WE MUST ORGANIZE. I am writing a White Paper this summer for CautionClick and the other RSOL groups I belong to (Oklahoma and Ohio) for presentation to legislators, the judiciary, etc. The premise of this paper will be that non-contact, cp cases should be handled differently from contact cases. I want to see the laws and registry changed for everyone, of course. Cases such as Romeo and Juliet, and like Iwantmydad also must be changed, but a white paper should be streamlined, and cp is a place to start. Plus, my own life changed because of underage porn and I find it wholly irrational that possession of images, and the wide range of what is available, is prosecuted more harshly than contact crimes. And there is no proof that cp necessarily constitutes having predatory desires and will result in contact. In England and Wales a first time offense, with no previous criminal history, results in a severe warning and counseling. THAT makes sense.

A little about me - My husband's cp material was teenage nudity. No sex acts, no males, no adults and no prepubescents involved - just nudity of teens. Plus his participation was very very brief, ending a full year before the police showed up at our door. It is insane that he would have to suffer the same consequences as producers of child porn of little children. While he awaited sentencing he used his marketing skills to create a dynamite public service announcement campaign to warn men not to mess with this stuff. (We found that most people have NO idea the severity of the penalties until they are caught up in this.) Plus, It is unconscionable for the govt to administer such harsh penalties, expecting them to be a deterrent, yet there is NO program warning people and NO ONE KNOWS!

I have TONS, and I do mean TONS, of research and you are welcome to everything I have. If you email me I can send you a 7 page list of abstracts of about 10 different papers by psychs and attorneys decrying these laws. You can write me at Claire5353.a@aol.com.

I forgot to add that the campaign is a complete package called "Is It Worth It?" Instead of focusing on the wounded children or the moral outrage, the PSA ads are targeted at the men who access this stuff and telling them what they will lose if they even so much as dabble. Robert Weiss endorsed it. But it takes money and LOTS of time to get the necessary endorsements and get it into the hands of the right people. I even took the program to the Rochester, NY office of the NCMEC and they loved it. They thought it could really curb the market for cp. The director told me he would put it before Ernie Allen and get back to me. I never heard from him again. Can you imagine? You give a PREVENTION program on a silver platter to an organization dedicated to saving children in general, and saving kids from child porn in particular. You'd think they would leap at it. Methinks they are more interested knocking off men in possession of it, one at a time, rather than doing some damn prevention.

I have very often seen limewire listed on here when ever someone is talking about cp. I am not sure exactly what kind of site they are but if this is where so much of it comes from ..why arn't they shut down

They were shut down, but only recently. You are right - LOTS of Limewire cases serving time in prison now.

I am so grateful for all the response from this, it has given me a lot to think about and look at. We have been very fortunate with our support network. We moved to PA only 3 years ago due to my husband being transferred then our world came crashing down. All our family is in the mid west, so we went through all of this without them, but they are aware of this and know my husband would never harm a child. We have great friends and a church that we attended that are aware of all of this, (as some of you know, everything gets plastered on the television and news papers), and has never once questioned and have only supported us. My husband has found employment but making a quarter of what he was making, it was with a small family owed business but they were willing to take a chance on him and we are very grateful. The church has been a hugh support and we have met wonderful people, and right know (ChevelleMuf) I know it feels like you are alone and scared but this too shall pass, and you have to keep fighting through it. I also had 2 kids and it was very difficult for my 14 year old because everyone at his school seen his father on the news, but he too has gotten through this and with the support we are a closer family. Now I just wanted the laws to change for your husband, my husband, everyone because this is wrong. If anyone needs anything you can email me at christad5@comcast.net. I think if we all work on this we can make a change. Clair thank you so much for your information I will email you.

@ angelalutz - You are very very lucky he did not have to serve time. Frankly, 5 years probation is unheard of. And my husband had the least of the least of cp. His pre-sentencing report said it barely qualified as "child porn" and still, even when he crafted a campaign against it, he got 2 years and we consider that light by comparison of the others. How did it come to be your husband got just the probation?

If you all want to do anything to help, get involved with your state's RSOL organization. I belong to OK, Ohio, and NY. right now Ohio has a campaign on to find out what it costs the taxpayers to run the registry and they are looking for volunteers to make the calls.

He got 5 months house arrest also, I am guessing it was because of the 1min and 42 second video, that was all he had, and when they took his computer, it did not show it on there, they got him during the sting the day he downloaded it, as I said he did not intend to view it, and he deleted it as soon as he opened it and seen it was not the legal porn he was looking for. We have been very lucky on this as I read the stories on here it could have been a lot worse. He has no restrictions he is considerd and offender not a preditor. I think what helped him is they day after it the FBI came into our home, he was meeting with a counslor which was certified in the county we live in and that counslor sent several letters to the judge and DA saying he did not intended to do this and is a no risk to harm a child. My frustration is know he is on the megan's law for life!!! There is something wrong with that, these me did not touch anyone, I think if it was not this hugh sting in the county we lived the punishment would not off been so harsh, as I feel. Everyone from the DA, to our attorney new he did not intenionally do this but no one care, this was all about the DA's public image, and he wanted everone to believe he got a criminal off the street. But what no one cared about was my husband had a zero criminal record, never been in trouble in his life. This is the thanks we all get for being law abiding citizens.

My husband was just sentenced last Thursday for this same crap! Limewire is the WORST possible program ever invented. I consider us lucky because he got 5 years probation, and we had a PD that actually cared. But it never should have happened in the first place! A ton of wasted goverment money over 9 stupid pictures that could have been downloaded by anyone that had access the the computer. I am so disgusted with the legal system, I cannot even express it. My heart goes out to anyone who has a loved one facing this nightmare. Any petitions I can sign or anything I can do to help, please send my way. I hate that we are all in this prediciment, but it is nice to have people who understand. :)