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Proposed Posting of Clients List In Prostitution Case Raises Privacy Concerns
An anonymous reader writes "An interesting case touching on privacy in the Internet age has erupted in Kennebunk, Maine, the coastal town where the Bush family has a vacation home. When a fitness instructor who maintained a private studio was arrested for prostitution, she turned out to have maintained meticulous billing records on some 150 clients, and had secretly recorded the proceedings on video files stored in her computer. Local police have begun issuing summons to her alleged johns, and have announced intentions to publish the list, as is customary in such cases. Police believe such publication has a deterrent effect on future incidents of the kind. However, the notoriety of the case has some, including newspaper editors, wondering whether the lives of the accused johns may be disproportionately scarred (obtaining or keeping a job, treatment of members of their families within the community) for a the mere accusation of having committed a misdemeanor. Also, the list of names will be permanently archived and indexed by search engines essentially forever."
The more names of 'important' people who are on the list, the more it should be published. Maybe then someone will actually decide that prosecuting consensual crimes like this isn't generally worth the risk.
Though, waiting until she and her partner are found guilty might be a good plan.
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wouldn't it be pornography and be legal?
I guess that whole silly "innocent until proven guilty" is so outdated.
just make prostitution legal (and regulated) like most of Europe. You can even tax the income, while ensuring the safety of the workers and the clients. For bonus points, I grew in Wells, ME, about 10km south of Kennebunk ... and this kinda of ridiculous attention to foolish stories/details like this is one of the reasons I left (small town politics, anyone?) A john's life destroyed? Hardly, especially not by an "employer" with half a brain.
If there is a criminal, prosecute them. Think no further and go no further. It is not anyone's place to preempt in such a manner. Just stay in your own lane.
Personally, I feel that people need to stay out of someone else's pants. Prosecuting people for selling sex is a lazy approach to human rights and a sign of the populace sticking it's nose where it doesn't belong in the first place.
Somehow, I recall George Carlin's words on the topic:
I don't understand why prostitution is illegal. Selling is legal. Fucking is legal. Why isn't selling fucking legal?
If selling fucking were legal (as in some other jusrisdictions of the world), the criminal in question would not be a criminal, and the perpetrators of the misdemeanor in question would not have committed a misdemeanor.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
...so we can deter future johns. Otherwise they'll just victimize more -- oh, wait, are the johns the victims? Or is it the johns who victimize the prostitutes? Both?
OK, let's publish the list so that future johns will be deterred from victimizing themselves. Or something.
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Sounds like they were making legal pornography to me.
Here in Minnesota, that's all you see on Adult Friend Finder. Legal prostitution under the guise of making pornography. As long as you record it, you can pay her for it.
If I were the defense attorney I'd be harping on this crucial fact. IANAL and I do not know if making pornography is illegal in Maine.
Because the second they put it online, someone else will rehost it and make it available for search.
I am so happy I pay by wire and never use my real name! Yay, go me!
The problem with this is what happens when the pseudonym that you use happens to be someone else's name? That person will be completely innocent of any crime but will probably have their name dragged through the mud because it is included on a list. A similar thing happened in the UK a few years ago when the police busted a child pornography ring. They then went around and very publicly arrested all the people whose credit cards had been used. While they undoubtedly exposed and arrested several child molesters they also tarnished the reputations of completely innocent people who had had their credit cards stolen.
My feeling is that they should not release something like this until all those on it have at least been charged with the associated crime. Even this can lead to mistakes - as seen in the UK - but at least then there will be a clear record of the mistake and the possibility of consequences for truly incompetent ones that should motivate police to act carefully. After all if they have sufficient evidence to convict someone of a crime in a law court then surely they have a duty to do so? If they don't have that much evidence then they should not be trying to convict someone in the court of public opinion instead - it's unprofessional and potentially wide open to abuse.
John Smith
...
Bob Jones
Mickey Mouse
John Doe
I.P. Freely
Rosie O'Donnell
Robert Jones
Jim Johnson
I.M. Sparticus
Mayor Quimby
Dave Smith
John Johnson
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
John Cooper
John Smith
John Baker
John Howard
John Davis
John Brookhead
John Wilson
Juan Mendez
Juan Morales
Johen Schmidt
Jean Billet
Jean Claude
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
The johns aren't being charged with a crime.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
Only if the person filming isn't having sex.
California fought and lost the case so now many other states who have laws making it illegal are afraid to prosecute and become centers for porn production as California has.
Personally- when are we going to get past this sex/money thing. Even this sex thing.
How many conservatives need to be found having gay sex before they stop trying to make it illegal? How many people of both political persuasions need to be found having sex for money before they make it legal.
Not everyone is attractive enough to get sex.
And if you are really rich, and give the sex partner on a car and keep an apartment for them to live in- somehow it's suddenly not prostitution and is legal again.
Now that women are using prostitutes more, perhaps they'll get behind legalization. However, most vice squads are still focused on female/male and male/male prostitutes and ignore male/female and female/female prostitutes.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
So since drinking lots of alcohol is legal and driving a car is legal then drink driving should be legal? Voltaire is correct but the absurdity here is your argument.
Drinking is legal. Driving is legal. Having had drinks prior to driving is also legal, up to a limit. That's because after that limit you're a danger to yourself and also society. How is having sex a danger to society?
Is this standard procedure for EVERY criminal case? Are the names of other defendants published for every trial to come out of that court? I know most cases are public record that anyone can access if they care.
Yes. And not just those charged, but pretty much every adult appearing in the police blotter for any reason that day. Pretty common practice at small-town papers across the country.
I absolutely think we need to pull our heads out of our asses when it comes to puritanical prohibitions on consensual sex (even for pay), but we don't live in that world. These guys committed a crime and got caught, and now they get to suffer all the associated consequences (such as getting their five minutes of (in)fame in the local paper) of that crime. Simple as that.
Walking out of a store is legal. Putting things in your pocket is legal. But putting things in your pocket and walking out of the store is considered a completely different act.
I guess you cannot deconstruct laws and debate the individual parts in an attempt to make a rational argument about the whole.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Seems to me that if I find some hot chick on the streets, and offer her (by, for example, gesturing towards my groin with a number of folded-up negotiable instruments, such as $100 bills,) and she proceeds to perform sexual acts upon my person, and then upon completion I hand her the aforementioned stack of bills, that no crime has been committed should this act have taken place in anywhere in the United States, provided the acts were between consenting adults, and occur in a private place where we were both permitted to be. The law that makes these acts of pandering and prostitution legal, in my NAL opinion, is the US Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling.
The way I understand it, the exchange of money for anything, (to wit, in that case, the giving of money without any meaningful or timely accounting of who gave it, to whom it was given, how much was given, what was promised or agreed in exchange for it, or what was ultimately done with that money, which could easily include actions that any sane society would consider election tampering, vote-buying, influence pedaling, and interfering with the good order and function of a democratic republic's most vital political organs,) is considered inviolable "free" speech, protected by the first amendment to the United States Constitution. I have even toyed with the idea of going out and hiring prostitutes, hoping to find an undercover officer to proposition, just so it can be brought to court, so that I can defend myself with the first amendment's newly endowed power (given by the Citizens United ruling,) to protect anything for which some money changes hands as "speech".
I would say I "told" her (by handing the whore the cash,) that I would like her to suck-start my dick, then take it for a spin, bouncing her ass up and down on me until I'm ready to nut. I would argue that her taking the money constituted her "listening" to my constitutionally protected speech.
I imagine the judge would then shoot me down, saying that that was not an allowable defense, to which I would reply, (and most likely be held in contempt of court for saying,) "so it's okay for whores in Washington D.C. to get paid to fuck people over, and somehow that's protected speech, but somehow when I do it, it's a misdemeanor? What kind of freeze-dried fucking bullshit is that, you pretentious bitch?
If I'm going to jail for contempt, fuck, I say, might as well show it... why not piss on the judge's face? It's not like it's going to change what happens!
OTOH, I've heard bad things about jail, and I like being able to go for walks and not being stuck in a fucking cage, so I'll let someone who's more of a tough-guy take this idea and run with it. Post back on /. how it works out! I'll check back from time to time.
If prostitution wasn't illegal the prostitutes would just go to the police if the clients or bosses did anything.
Here is a more direct analogy:
Selling is legal. Donating a kidney is legal. Selling a kidney is illegal (in the U.S.).
I think even George Carlin (who was a comedian, we may need to recall) realized that laws reflect a society's collective (not unanimous!) views as to what is "right" and "wrong".
Then make it a strictly state-controlled business, where legal authority releases prostitution authorizations, regularly check on the health of the operators, etc.
As you clearly state, prostitution needs some sort of authority to prevent abuses on the operators, so make it some legitimate authority, not some improvised pimp.
Prostitution is not going to disappear in any way, at least try to control it.
You mean people should be considered innocent until proven guilty? What a bizarre concept.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
The reason prostitutes can be victimized by johns and therefore need pimps to look after them is because prostitution is illegal, if it were legal they could go to the police when their clients abuse them, when it is illegal they don't have the option of going to the police.
i am not a prude. but if there were a way to REGULATE (yes, this would have to be a highly regulated business, my libertarian friends) prostitution heavily, then i have no problem with it
so prostitutes would have to get regular screening. and the kind of human trafficking you see attached to the skin trade would have to be closely monitored and cracked down on. europe has legal prostitution. now ask europe about it's human trafficking problems. this is not a glamorous and lucrative and carefree industry, it never was. it is very easily and very often abusive and miserable. heavy regulation has to predominate
the problem with selling sex is that it is not just sexually adventurous carefree libertines. it often and easily turns into a particularly vile form of economic exploitation. so if prostitution would ever be made legal, it would have to be regulated heavily
regulate it heavily, i have no problem with it
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Then make it a strictly state-controlled business, where legal authority releases prostitution authorizations, regularly check on the health of the operators, etc.
OMG, you want to turn the US into Europe? You must be communist.
(I learned something on /. today. I really didn't know prostitution was illegal in the US.)
There is the police. It can prosecute violent 'customers' just like all other violent crimes. And if they feel the need for extra security, they can hire a guard (just like all other businesses). Health requirements can be set by law, again like all other professions.
Way to miss the point. Carlin was the court jester, the only one allowed to mock the King. He was a philosopher who made a living picking out absurdities and presenting them to an audience. He didn't have an "Act", he had a lecture.
He wasn't making an argument, and everyone here trying to pull apart an argument that doesn't exist are tilting at windmills which also do not exist.
He was not making an argument, he was simply pointing out something that, in a certain context, appears to be an absurdity. It is more word play than anything else.
If you watch his lecture, he specifically says he doesn't understand it, not that it should be legal. The closest he gets to an argument is
Further, he compares military recognition for killing or maiming people, with going to jail for giving someone an orgasm. There's your argument, if you want to find one.
This whole "thing plus other thing" nonsense is a red herring, and everyone who participated is an idiot.
This is only a problem because powerful men have their names on that list. If it were blue-collar workers, teh list woudl already have been released.
These guys want to pay to fark some hotties who likes to make videos of her masturbating with a popsicle? The law says that their names will be published since she was arrested for prostitution?
Let the law be the same for everybody here. Perhaps the powerful men will learn a valuable lesson.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
The saddest part of this kind of crap is just how silly it all is. If instead of just paying her for private sex the "johns" were paying her to make a private "adult film" (with them as director and co-star), then she would simply be an "adult film star" and they would be making "pornography" which is perfectly legal. Take away the camera and suddenly it's "prostitution" which is illegal. Even though the participants and the sex acts will be exactly the same.
What... the... FUCK?
How many more decades or centuries will it be before society at large finally acknowledges that it is complete bizarro-world insanity for "consensual sex for money" to continue to be highly illegal while "consensual sex for money IN FRONT OF A CAMERA" is perfectly legal? It's the same goddamn thing for Christ's sake! Make up your fucking mind!
Prostitution should be exactly as legal as pornography. Legalize it, regulate it, tax it, and test sex workers for STDs/HIV at least once a month just exactly the same as they do with "adult film stars". Any other course is utter nonsense. A few of the actual civilized countries of the world seem to have figured this out, but I give the US another century before it happens here. At least.
"The act of prostitution deprives prostitutes of their freedom and of the control over their bodies."
How is this different from anyone who earns a paycheck in a mindless manufacturing job?
I do agree that it should be legal and regulated.
What's so special about sex that it requires stricter state control than daycare centers, food processing, compounding pharmacies, etc.?
Bullshit. A a prostitute, who is generally a sole-proprietor, controls the terms and conditions of her body's use to a greater extent than most workers. Being acted on directly by another is not any more oppressive than being acted on by the work environment controlled by the boss, though of course there also jobs like contact sports entertainment. Taboos aside, working for a sub-survival wage is rationally more shameful than being paid well, unless you are doing something truly reprehensible like practicing law.
I live in Holland where prostitution is legal, to the extend politicians had to decide on how to treat jobs in the sex industry in regards to job centers and people on benefits having to take any suitable job or loose their benefits. (Decision was that they are allowed to advertise but it can't be mandated as a suitable job or suggested by a consultant helping you to find a job.
The problem is that the happy hooker is a lie, pretty woman is not reality-TV. No mentally stable, non-self-loathing woman with options will choose to be come a prostitute. There is the idea of female students putting themselves through school by selling their body but lets face it, no woman who really has a future would do it, since having a history of being a prostitute will hurt your career and social future.
Be honest, would you date a hooker? Marry her? No? Well there you go.
There are women who want to be a prostitute but they do it for money/laughs. Problem with that is, they want to make a decent living with it and charge through the nose. High class escort really just means "you expect WHAT per hour", they don't come cheap. I know, I made websites for them. Think 2000 euro per night and then extra for extra's. These are NOT the women who walk the streets. Hell, some escorts even are picky as to who they take as clients. Do you think a street walker or a woman working behind the glass in Amsterdam has such options?
The reality of most prostitution is that the women has to do anything that any john asks and lets face it, nice guys don't use street hookers. And you might think a slut as being a woman who has men in the high double digits. For a hooker? Closing in on 4 digits. Think about it. Say it is 100 per fuck (a very high price). A developer might charge the same but can do it for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, all your long. That is 2016 johns in a year, just to get the same income as a crappy web developer. Remember, if prostitution is legal, you have to pay the same taxes as any other self employed person. You can do web development in a cheap t-shirt and jeans. An expensive hooker needs more expensive clothes.
And all the time, she risks some insane person coming along and killing her off. Really want the most dangerous job in the world? Prostitution, the favorite target of serial killers.
The simple fact is that in Holland, with legal prostition, human trafficking for the sex trade hasn't dropped at all. That is because the amount of Dutch women who have decent social protection who choose prostitution to make their living is far to low and isn't serving the low end of the market. You don't think a college girl putting herself through school who has any reason to want that diploma is going to work several johns a day for what amounts to minimum wage after they payed their pimp for protection and all the other costs?
The porn industry is probably better known on Slashdot, check income. (and remember, this is income of a self-employed person so the prices are pre-taxes with no benefits) of actresses, the majority not the statistically insignificant few who made it to the top. A picture shoot earns as little as a few hundred, maybe 500 if she does all the site asks. A VHS tape might earn 1-2 thousand back in the day. If you are self-employed in IT, would you even bother answering the phone for such amounts? Especially knowing that the porn industry is always looking for fresh faces, so it is not as if you can do 5 shoots per day, every working day of the year.
Yes, I know, cases such as this show rather decent amounts of money being made. They are the exception, same as some programmers on Wall Street make 1 million dollars or more. Do you make 1 million dollars or more? No? Well, then you are the street walker, no the high class pretty woman escort.
I am not saying making prostitution illegal is the answer but making it legal in Holland has not magically fixed everything. In fact, in some ways it has become worse. It used to be possible for the police to liberate women who were
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
But the discussion here is why prostitution is illegal. If it was legal, then there would be no problems with informing the police. And the public law enforcement wouldn't be substituted by the guards, it would just be supplemented - just like with all other private guards. A customer is less likely to start beating a prostitute if there is a 300 pound gorilla sitting outside in the lobby.
Crap. I've met a few ladies in my time. They choose their hours, the terms and conditions, and they generally earn above the average wage. This is more than most people can say about their jobs. There is a whole world out there that people like you probably aren't aware of. Not everyone is afraid of sex with strangers, and if you can get paid for it and not have to work a shit house minimum wage job to pay the bills then that is about as liberating as you can get.
What about 'innocent until proven guilty?'
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