Patrick Naughton \nWASHINGTON - When Patrick Naughton was arrested for soliciting sex from a 13-year-old girl he met online, the Infoseek/GO Network executive wasn't the first to be caught in a porn sting. The FBI has arrested over 700 on charges from child porn trafficking to luring minors for sex across state lines, by prowling the Internet portraying young boys and girls.
CNET says the bureau's Innocent Images program also has received $10 million in funding in the past two years, with new teams being formed across the country. And civil liberties groups and defense attorneys are watching these operations very closely, with some convictions being challenged on Constitutional grounds, CNET says.
One of the appeals is said to involve a prize-winning journalist. He was sentenced to 18 months behind bars for possessing child porn, CNET says, with his defense that he was researching a story turned down by the court. The American Civil Liberties Union says cases like these have potential problems ranging from entrapment to illegal search and seizure.
Naughton's arrest is said to be typical of the style. He was arrested 16 September in Santa Monica, CA, after he'd allegedly agreed to meet a teenage girl for sex after meeting her online, but the girl was actually an FBI agent. And the bureau tells CNET they have "no shortage" of targets in these cases.
"Just as a kid doesn't know who they are talking to, pedophiles don't know who they are talking to, either," special agent Peter Gulotta tells CNET.
But legal experts tell the online news site that Naughton's case might involve a potential claim of entrapment but little other in the way of Constitutional issues. And other California suspects in comparable cases face charges under a state law aimed at sexually-explicit Net talk with minors, CNET says - yet the statute itself raises Constitutional questions such as whether it's fully possible to confirm the age of a Web surfer.
Such cases take some odd turns, though, even when the defendant in question might suspect a kind of setup. One involves a California man arrested when he arranged to meet a teenager who turned out to be a local police officer - but his attorney says he expected to meet a bored housewife.
But another legal analyst tells CNET that if she said she was a teen and he expressed a belief that she was a teen, "he doesn't have that defense". And the FBI usually keeps at hand a very powerful weapon in such cases - detailed records of the online conversations in which their agents are involved, which has some civil libertarians concerned that other law enforcement operating similar stings might be doing likewise.
