[81334] in Cypherpunks
Thomases lose appeal in second case
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Stewart)
Fri Jun 6 16:10:36 1997
Date: Fri, 06 Jun 1997 09:57:02 -0700
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
From: Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com>
Reply-To: Bill Stewart <stewarts@ix.netcom.com>
Remember the Amateur Action BBS case from 1994, when Robert Thomas
got convicted by a Federal court in Tennessee for distributing pornography
on his BBS in California? Well, he was also prosecuted in Utah
for distributing pornography from the BBS (the Merc doesn't say if it
was a state or federal prosecution, but it looks like state),
and he just lost his appeal in Federal court. One of his defense arguments
was double jeopardy, and the court rejected that because the
Utah court busted him for different pictures than the Tennessee court.
While distributing child pornography is reprehensible, it's still
none of Utah's business; the ACLU lawyer defending Thomas says there's
no evidence that any Utah citizens actually downloaded any (except the
police).
# Thanks; Bill
# Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com
# You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto/pgp
# (If this is a mailing list or news, please Cc: me on replies. Thanks.)
