fictional Stories of rape/murder of kids under 9 leads to charges

[The Straight Story]

Web Site Operator Charged With Obscenity
Sep 27 5:46 PM US/Eastern

By JOE MANDAK
Associated Press Writer


A woman who authorities say ran a Web site that published graphic fictional tales about the torture and sexual abuse of children has been indicted on federal obscenity charges.

"Use of the Internet to distribute obscene stories like these not only violates federal law, but also emboldens sex offenders who would target children," U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan said Wednesday in announcing the charges against Karen Fletcher, 54.

Excerpts of her stories were available to all visitors to her Web site, while others paid to read whole stories, prosecutors said.

Fletcher was indicted by a federal grand jury Tuesday on six counts involving six stories about the kidnapping, torture, sexual molestation and murder of children 9 and under. The charges carry five years in prison each.

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/09/27/D8KDF2H00.html

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

1. Dupe...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=2236951&mesg_id=2236951

But noteworthy!

[The Straight Story]

5. DOH! Thanks (nt)

[omega minimo]

2. Still draggin in the trash, huh SS?

[The Straight Story]

4. Yeah, what can I say

The government stuff I post just slides down the history tubes anyway, so I slid down a notch :)

[Matariki]

3. as distasteful as it is, why is WRITTEN material illegal?

i don't understand.

[rpannier]

6. It's vile, disgusting, horrid, etc

But they're just stories.
I don't buy the arguement "...also emboldens sex offenders who would target children,"
Under that lame arguement, if I write a story or make a movie about a serial killer, I could embolden murderers and should go to jail.

I know some will disagree, but this 'saving society from what someone may do' logic has just got to stop. It's far more dangerous than these stories could ever hope to be.

[SmokingJacket]

7. This kinda thing makes me feel positively totalitarian.

I mean, ugh. I hate to clamp down on anyone's freedom of speech, but it's hard to get too upset about this. At the same time, it's a terrible precendent.

Yo, fucked-up kiddie pornologists! How about keeping your nasty stories to yourself so we don't have to go around defending you?? Because people arent' going to want to after a while, and will lose faith in the need to defend *anyone*...