Teens Gets Off Easy for Possession Of Child Pornography
Most teenagers looking for an easy way to make some extra cash will resort to mowing their neighbors’ lawns, babysitting their kids, or perhaps getting a part-time job at a fast food restaurant. But, one thing’s for sure, some teenagers should not be pursuing child care opportunities.
A teenager, wishing to remain unnamed, who resorted to trying to sell child pornography material to perverts as a desperate attempt to earn money has gotten himself into a whole slew of legal trouble, but amazingly, he managed to get out of a jail sentence. Police obtained eight gigabytes of the explicit material from an 18-year-old boy who was subsequently asked to appear in court on a number of child exploitation material charges including obtaining, possessing and disseminating the online files.
According to court records, the boy told Judge Jack Costello that he was approached while playing online video games by a fellow gamer back when he was 17 years old. The gamer asked the boy if he could hang on to some files of his in exchange for cash. Initially, the boy declined, but would eventually agree to download the files to a drop box location and store them for the man. Once the payment was received, the youth deleted the files. However, the easy income source stuck in his mind, and approximately one year later when he desperately needed extra cash, he turned to downloading child pornography onto his laptop.
He downloaded eight gigabytes of unlawful files ‘in the hope that others might be interested in paying you money to have access…’ Judge Costello said. Instead of getting some quick cash, however, law enforcement immediately tracked the illegal activity and raided his home, taking possession of the computer. A total 250 files were found, all ranking rather low on the explicitness spectrum. Police have indicated the youth cooperated with their efforts.
Over the course of their investigation, officers discovered that the 18-year-old had had some run-ins with his parents in recent years, and they had kicked him out of their home at 16. He was struggling, depressed, and had attempted suicide on two occasions. Court records refer to the way he was living as “hand to mouth” and desperately needed easy ways to support himself. He was not financially stable, not qualified to seek out a long-term career and not mentally competent to even have the motivation to do so.
‘Although your offending was apparently actuated by the prospect of material gain, I am satisfied that the real motivation for committing these offences was … one borne of need rather than greed,’ Judge Costello concluded at his trial. ‘I would categorize your offending behavior as the actions of an immature and naive young man struggling to deal with psychological unrest in his life.’
The teen was originally ordered to serve one year and six months in jail with a non-parole period of 9 months. However Judge Costello completely suspended his sentence after considering all the facts. Hopefully, all of the court bills he incurred to get cleared will be a lesson learned so seek out more respectable income sources.
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