It took us thirty years to get from Basketweaving 101 to Cybersex 101, but here we are, courtesy of San Francisco State - that college has just given the world's first university-level class taking an academic approach to cybersex. Course materials reportedly included one of the first interactive adult CD-ROM games, Virtual Valerie. Instructor Mary Madden started with the history of technology's connections to sex, and came around to this conclusion: "Whenever a new technology emerged, we found a way to turn ourselves on." As in, photography leading inevitably to porn, the automobile leading to the drive-in theater, porn leading to the VCR, and, now, the Internet going from military communications and academic research to sexual expression and stimulation from almost the word "enter". Speaking of entry, the San Francisco State cybersex course is a non-credit course.
MARIETTA, Ga. - Using his unwitting sons as bait to lure adolescent girls to his home to molest, rape, and secretly videotape them has garnered eighteen years in prison for Nathan Fisher. The crimes occurred between 1996 and 1997 according to Cobb County District Attorney Pat Head, who maintains there was never any reason to believe the sons knew their father's true activities. Head pleaded guilty in March and told the court he often had parties for his young sons so the girls would come to the house. Twenty-three such victims testified at Head's sentencing hearing about their ordeals. Fisher also received twenty years' probation to follow his prison term, is required to register as a sex offender, and must serve at least 90 percent of the term before he's eligible for parole.
ROYAL OAK, Mich. - In this town formerly known as the home base of the infamous "Radio Priest," Father Charles Coughlin, a young woman testified in tears May 5 about discovering a videotape of herself in the shower. The 18-year-old testified at a preliminary exam for Golden Blount, who's charged with violating Michigan's eavesdropping law by planting a hidden video camera to spy on the young woman - a friend of his own 18-year-old daughter who sublet a room in Blount's rented home here. The victim - who identified Blount in court - reportedly gave police the video, a radio with a hidden video camera she found in a bathroom, and a five page letter of apology from Blount. The videotape reportedly shows a second unidentified woman in the nude as well. The preliminary exam continues May 17, with Blount facing two years in prison and up to a $2,000 fine if convicted.
--- Compiled by Humphrey Pennyworth
