×

Teens, phones and photos

Practice of ‘sexting’ can have serious legal consequences

WITH AUTHORITIES REPORTING a rise in local teen sexting cases, both young people and their parents should be aware of the potential legal consequences, as well as long-term social repercussions, of the activity. Sexting, a combination of the words “sex” and “texting,” involves taking and sharing sexually explicit photos, usually via a mobile device such as a cell phone or tablet. (Theresa Proudfit/Daily News photo)

IRON MOUNTAIN — Teens may think sharing sexually explicit photos of themselves through mobile devices — commonly known as sexting — is harmless fun, perhaps as a dare or to flirt.

But with authorities reporting a rise in local teen sexting cases, both young people and their parents should be aware of the potential legal consequences, as well as long-term social repercussions of the activity.

A person must be 18 or older to appear in pornographic material, according to Michigan law, so sending naked, erotic photos of anyone younger amounts to distributing child pornography.

“People don’t realize the law doesn’t distinguish between a pedophile with pornography and young people sharing photos of themselves,” Dickinson County Prosecutor Lisa Richards said. “They’re all lumped together.”

Creating child pornography is a 20-year felony. Sharing it is a seven-year felony and simply having it — whether on a cell phone or computer — is a four-year felony.

Conviction on any of these offenses can mean landing on the Sex Offender Registry.

Richards, along with local police, recently reviewed a sexting case involving five 15-year-olds from Iron Mountain, Kingsford and Norway high schools who could have been prosecuted for producing, distributing and possessing child pornography.

Although Richards decided against juvenile criminal charges in that instance, she said the time comes when warnings aren’t enough.

“Given that the message is now out, future reports involving allegations of sexting may well result in the filing of criminal proceedings,” she said.

A local problem

While Richards didn’t have any specific numbers available on recent Dickinson County teen sexting cases, she said there were “enough to cause concern.”

The cases have involved subjects as young as 13, are fairly equal between boys and girls and are usually based on “selfie” photos a teen takes of himself or herself and then sends to another person, Richards said.

Most cases investigated by the Kingsford Public Safety Department involved either teens daring each other to share photos of themselves or a boyfriend and girlfriend situation, KPS Sgt. Brandon Rutter said.

KPS has yet to handle a case of teens taking naked photos of others and sharing them, Sgt. Tim Olsen added.

Some recent cases saw teens utilizing mobile device apps such as Facebook Messenger and Snapchat to pass along questionable photos, the officers said.

The teen sexting complaints came from both parents and school officials, the officers said, adding it’s not uncommon for cases to extend far beyond school district boundaries.

When investigating sexting cases, officers can get search warrants to seize teens’ cell phones, tablets or computers as evidence, which then go to the Michigan State Police crime lab in Marquette for processing.

Teens and cell phones

Sexting can happen anywhere, considering how many teens have their own cell phones or tablets with photo and internet capabilities.

Rutter and Olsen estimated about half of younger Kingsford Middle School students have cell phones, with the percentage rising as students mature.

Even if teens don’t have their own mobile devices, photos easily can be taken and sent via laptop or desktop computers.

At Norway-Vulcan Area Schools, students in third through 12th grade have their own school-issued iPads that officials try to monitor, Superintendent Lou Steigerwald said.

“Students don’t own the devices, so there’s no expectation of privacy,” he explained. “We can search them at any time.”

Although Norway schools don’t ban personal cell phones, students aren’t supposed to have them in class. If the phones “cause a disruption to the school environment,” officials can ask for the device, and if there’s suspicion of criminal activity, they can contact the local police department, Steigerwald said.

The younger generation often is more tech-savvy than their parents, and more knowledgeable about mobile device apps for sexting.

One such app is a fully functional calculator that only reveals a secret photo vault when the user enters the correct security code, Norway-Vulcan Area Schools Technology Coordinator Steve Andrews said.

“Using a common app like a calculator is the best way to camouflage this,” he noted. “There’s quite a few of these, and they keep coming out.”

Long-term consequences

Deleting a photo may seem as easy as clicking a button, but that doesn’t mean it’s gone forever.

When investigating sexting cases, Rutter said officers often find online conversations in which the teen tells the recipient not to share the photos. But there’s no guarantee that won’t happen.

Apps such as Snapchat are designed to show the recipient a photo for only a few seconds before it vanishes, which might seem an ideal platform to share inappropriate content.

However, recipients do have the ability to save these photos through a simple screenshot or other apps.

What’s more, app and social media companies themselves can store photos and conversations on their servers for years, Andrews warned — and could be hacked at any time.

“It provides a false sense of security,” Andrews said. “The data really never goes away.”

Teens who engage in sexting risk having those photos resurface in the future, possibly hindering their chances of getting scholarships or jobs, Rutter and Olsen said.

In extreme instances, these photos can have far worse results.

Richards pointed to the case of Jesse Logan, an Ohio teen who committed suicide after being bullied at school from a sexting incident. Logan had sent nude photos to her boyfriend, who then shared them with others when the couple broke up.

“For me, this is the worst consequence,” Richards said. “Legal consequences are just one aspect that’s life-altering for sure, but there are so many other non-legal consequences.”

What can parents do?

Authorities agree prosecutors, law enforcement, schools and parents need to join together to address teen sexting.

Richards and Trooper Geno Basanese of the Iron Mountain Michigan State Police post have given presentations on the dangers of sexting to all four high schools in the county, Kingsford officers talk to students on general internet safety as early as fourth grade and Norway teachers introduce the idea of “digital citizenship” to students in kindergarten.

But even though teen sexting might be happening in schools, school officials aren’t necessarily aware of every case, Steigerwald said.

That’s where parents come in.

“Parents need to know to check phones and check apps,” Olsen said. “Don’t be naive; this is happening.”

A 2015 survey of seventh-, ninth- and 11th-grade students in Dickinson and Iron County schools indicated 92 percent of them have some sort of social network account, 32 percent claimed their parents don’t monitor their internet use and 51 percent reported their parents monitor that use only “a little bit,” according to the Great Lakes Center for Youth Development.

Andrews recommended parents educate themselves on current technology and have an “open device policy” prohibiting their children from locking their cell phones or tablets. Monitoring app storage and usage figures also may provide clues about secret photos, he said.

“If you have a calculator app that uses five gigs, that should let you know something’s up right there,” Andrews said. “Calculators generally don’t use very much space.”

A parent of a local teen who agreed to talk to The Daily News anonymously said parents need to realize their children are growing up in a very different world.

“Back then, we might have come across a naked photo of a stranger and laughed about it with our friends, but that was where it ended,” the parent said. “This generation is living in a world where nudity is at their fingertips 24/7. Your 13-year-old son can be in my 13-year-old daughter’s virtual world at any time.”

“We monitor our kids’ phones and limit their online time not because we are strict parents but because we are smart parents,” the parent continued. “Kids make bad choices from time to time — it’s part of growing up — but we don’t want ours to end up in jail because they didn’t think before forwarding something inappropriate.”

Newsletter

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *
   

Starting at $4.62/week.

Subscribe Today