Wow good job - I cannot help thinking that it is so very convoluted that even LE cannot possibly know the extent - and at Halloween I found out that local LE THINK they know the law but they don't. How in the World are regular citizens supposed to understand this stuff? it is so out of hand and inflated that it would be ridiculous and funny if it were not so serious ...

Yes well written, I've read many of the briefs for the cases and it seems you summarized them very well. I agree there is definitely a grey area in the law when it comes to CP which you did a good job of showing. I think most of the people charged with CP are charged for non-gray area CP though. You used the example of the rape of a 4 year old. That is clearly CP and nothing else, that isn't grey but black and white.

I know you didn't get into it much but I agree the sentencing for CP is out of control ridiculous. Way too long of a sentence when the government cannot show a causative link between CP and contact crimes.

I will write a piece on sentencing eventually. I have a couple of old articles in need of revising first.

Thanks for the very thorough, and outstanding, piece. Well done!

Nice work, OnceFallen.

The largest problem from a criminal defense attorney's standpoint is the emotion generated by the charges. Child pornography has such an "ick" factor that a person cannot afford to go to trial. To the average person, CP means kids----very small kids----having sex, which makes people queasy.

Knowing this, a prosecutor can blur the lines somewhat and charge a defendant with questionable evidence. Unless the criminal defense attorney can get some of the evidence tossed, the defend

Nice work, OnceFallen.

The largest problem from a criminal defense attorney's standpoint is the emotion generated by the charges. Child pornography has such an "ick" factor that a person cannot afford to go to trial. To the average person, CP means kids----very small kids----having sex, which makes people queasy.

Knowing this, a prosecutor can blur the lines somewhat and charge a defendant with questionable evidence. Unless the criminal defense attorney can get some of the evidence tossed, the defendant cannot really go to trial as the risk is too great for a conviction followed by years and years in prison.

Since there is no real threat that the defendant will go to trial, the prosecutor no longer has to offer a sweetheart of a plea to the defendant, but can negotiate a plea on his own terms.

I know if I was a prosecutor and really wanted a conviction in a CP trial, I would make damn sure I picked a conservative jury and I would make sure that I presented some of those images in front of a jury. Seeing an infant being molested or children engaged in sex has such an emotional effect on the jury that basically the trial is over when they see the images.

Explaining the complexities of peer-to-peer file sharing or IP addresses to jurors is difficult, but they can understand all too well the image of children being subjected to a sexual assault. Jurors like evidence that they can see.

Once the jury sees the images or videos, it is game over for the defense in most instances. Once convicted by a jury trial, the defendant receives some unGodly sentence of decades in prison.

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@oncefallen You may want to run through your document again. There are some typos.

@InTheStepsOfJesus, the article has been edited. Anything within quotations are direct quotes and cannot be edited, and thus reposted verbatim.

I don't need your opinions, quite frankly. You criticize constantly, yet I have yet to see YOU offer anything valuable to the cause.