Yogi Berra was right...

[Santayana]

It's déjà vu all over again.

Another story-site operator was sentenced to 33 years, 9 months in prison,
for operating a "child obscenity" website. This gentleman operated his site
out of Belize, apparently figuring that this would provide him with a way
to avoid prosecution by the American authorities. Needless to say, that
didn't exactly work out as he planned... he's gonna die in prison, just
like Frank McCoy and Thomas Alan Arthur, a.k.a. Mr. Double.

I warned people that the McCoy and Arthur cases were just the start, and it
would appear that I was correct. Who knows just how many more cases are in
the pipeline? Who is gonna get popped next?

Santayana

===========================================================================

Press Release
Man Sentenced for Running Child Obscenity Website

Thursday, October 5, 2023

For Immediate Release

Office of Public Affairs

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/man-sentenced-running-child-obscenity-website

A California man was sentenced today to 33 years and nine months in prison
for multiple obscenity crimes involving children.

According to the indictment, Ron Kuhlmeyer, 65, of Santa Rosa, operated
a website that globally distributed stories about the rape, murder,
and sexual abuse of prepubescent children. Law enforcement determined
that Kuhlmeyer was running his obscenity website from Belize. Kuhlmeyer
wrote many of the stories himself but also published the works of other
offenders, including stories that had been previously published on Mr.
Double, another website dedicated to publishing writings that detail the
sexual abuse of children. Some of the stories on Kuhlmeyer's website
described the rape, torture, and murder of children, while others were
accompanied by lifelike computer-generated images of prepubescent children
being sexually abused.

On June 13, Kuhlmeyer pleaded guilty to five counts of importation or
transportation of obscene matters and one count of distributing obscene
visual representations of the sexual abuse of children. Kuhlmeyer was
previously convicted of Continuous Sexual Abuse of a Child in Sonoma
County, California, in 2008 and served six years in state prison.

In June 2021, Thomas Arthur, the owner of Mr. Double, was sentenced to 40
years in prison.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Nicole M. Argentieri of the Justice
Department's Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Jaime Esparza for the
Western District of Texas, Special Agent in Charge Francisco Burrola of
Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) El Paso, and Assistant Director
Luis Quesada of the FBI's Criminal Investigation Division made the
announcement.

HSI and the FBI investigated the case, with assistance from the government
of Belize.

Trial Attorneys Austin M. Berry and Adam Braskich of the Criminal
Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) and Assistant
U.S. Attorney Brandi Young for the Western District of Texas prosecuted
the case.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide
initiative to combat the epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse,
launched in May 2006 by the Justice Department. Led by U.S. Attorneys'
Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and
local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals
who exploit children via the internet, as well as to identify and rescue
victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit
www.justice.gov/psc.

Updated October 5, 2023

[Bottledfones]

It's hard to come to any conclusion after reading that article for two reasons: I'm not a lawyer and there were few details if any that would clarify the matter. Did he get in trouble because of the stories specifically or did the images played a bigger role in his demise? I was under the impression that a website follows the rules of the country that hosts it or something to that effect. I'm sure that his criminal history also played a role in this as he was probably already being monitored. If he was charged with a sexual crime in the past, then more than likely he is on a sexual offender list somewhere and possibly under supervision by a parole officer which means that he may have had conditions that he has to follow. What website did he run?

I just don't understand how there are so many websites such as AO3, sexstories, asstr, nifty, etc that have countless stories involving children under the legal age and which would be seen as obscene by the law more than likely, yet they continue to operate and their owners have eluded the law. My best guess is that so long as you follow every other law and do not attract attention to yourself, you should be relatively safe if you write such stories or if you host stories of this matter on your website. But if you are like Frank McCoy who decided to get involved in CP or if you fiddle around with a kid, then more than likely, they will prosecute you for as many charges as they can find.

[Santayana]

On Tue, 17 Oct 2023 10:26:03 -0700 (PDT), Bottledfones <c.na...@gmail.com>
said:

> On Monday, October 16, 2023 at 8:35:15 PM UTC-7, Santayana wrote:
>
>> It's déjà vu all over again.
>>
>> Another story-site operator was sentenced to 33 years, 9 months in
>> prison, for operating a "child obscenity" website. This gentleman
>> operated his site out of Belize, apparently figuring that this would
>> provide him with a way to avoid prosecution by the American authorities.
>> Needless to say, that didn't exactly work out as he planned... he's
>> gonna die in prison, just like Frank McCoy and Thomas Alan Arthur,
>> a.k.a. Mr. Double.
>>
>> I warned people that the McCoy and Arthur cases were just the start, and
>> it would appear that I was correct. Who knows just how many more cases
>> are in the pipeline? Who is gonna get popped next?
>>
>> Santayana

[press release snipped]

> It's hard to come to any conclusion after reading that article for two
> reasons: I'm not a lawyer and there were few details if any that would
> clarify the matter. Did he get in trouble because of the stories
> specifically or did the images played a bigger role in his demise?

The images may have been an aggravating factor; that said, remember that
Frank McCoy's works were NOT illustrated at all -- they were pure text.
Despite that, Frank's entire body of work was examined de-novo by the
court of appeal and condemned as obscene.

Mr. Double's works were also condemned as obscene, and the overwhelming
majority of these were non-illustrated as well. The fact that a work just
happens to be non-illustrated is no guarantee whatsoever against it being
adjudicated as obscene.

Please note the charges:

"...importation or transportation of obscene matters."

That is the very same statute McCoy was convicted of violating, a decade
ago, i.e. 18 USC §1462. (McCoy's trial was in 2010; the guilty verdict was
handed-down in the summer of 2013).

> I was under the impression that a website follows the rules of the
> country that hosts it or something to that effect.

I have no idea where his site was hosted, as of this writing, although I
suspect it may have been hosted in the United States, because 18 USC §1462
refers to transportation/importation into the United States, or an area
subject to its' jurisdiction.

> I'm sure that his criminal history also played a role in this as he was
> probably already being monitored.

In order to consider one's 'criminal history' the authorities would first
have to establish the alleged perpetrator's identity. As far as his being
'monitored'.. By whom? The Feds? Not terribly likely, as Kuhlmeyer was
living in Belize.

> If he was charged with a sexual crime in the past, then more than likely
> he is on a sexual offender list somewhere and possibly under supervision
> by a parole officer which means that he may have had conditions that he
> has to follow.

I sincerely doubt that the United States has parole officers in Belize.

> What website did he run?

I don't know, yet; that said, I suspect it was one that he ran himself,
because this would fit the current pattern seen so far in McCoy, Arthur,
etc.

> I just don't understand how there are so many websites such as AO3,
> sexstories, asstr, nifty, etc that have countless stories involving
> children under the legal age and which would be seen as obscene by the
> law more than likely, yet they continue to operate and their owners have
> eluded the law.

I have long believed that the reason that McCoy, Arthur and (very likely)
Kuhlmeyer were all targeted was because they were low-hanging fruit. McCoy
and Arthur both ran sites themselves, and I suspect the same is true of
Kuhlmeyer. Neither McCoy nor Arthur took any particular pains to hide their
identities -- both of them were easily located, and raided. (I suspect the
same is true of Kuhlmeyer).

Going after individuals is like shooting fish in a barrel, and that goes
double if the aforesaid individuals make no attempts whatsoever to conceal
their identities.

FWIW, I took notice of the fact that this press-release made a specific
mention of the Arthur case -- it would appear that they're just building-up
the precedential foundation brick-by-brick, case-by-case.

The authorities work to their own timetables, and they're obviously not in
a hurry. The initial prosecutions go back to 2006, with the Louise "Red
Rose" Fletcher case, the McCoy case following in 2008-2010, the Arthur case
in 2019, and the Kuhlmeyer case this year (2023).

How, precisely, they are choosing targets is unclear at this point, except
to say that it would appear they are targeting individuals hosting 'obscene'
materials, whether written by themselves or by others. The common thread in
the Louise "Red Rose" Fletcher case, the McCoy case, the Arthur case, and
now (presumably) the Kuhlmeyer case is that they all ran their own websites.

> My best guess is that so long as you follow every other law and do not
> attract attention to yourself, you should be relatively safe if you write
> such stories or if you host stories of this matter on your website.

I am not a great fan of the "Hope and pray they don't notice me" strategy.
If the authorities /do/ notice you, you're screwed, unless you've taken
appropriate countermeasures.

> But if you are like Frank McCoy who decided to get involved in CP or if
> you fiddle around with a kid, then more than likely, they will prosecute
> you for as many charges as they can find.

That's reasonable, but Frank was never prosecuted for CP (at least at his
first trial.)

What I find most interesting is that almost no one asks the question:

"How /did/ the authorities know that Frank had CP?"

The answer is simple: Frank never made /any/ secret of who he was, or where
he lived, so it was literal child's play to locate him and raid him. The
authorities purportedly found the contraband on his computer(s).

It's also interesting that Frank was *NOT* prosecuted on child pornography
charges; the only charges he faced, and was ultimately prosecuted/convicted
on, in his first trial which took place in the Middle District of Georgia,
were the "transportation of obscene matters" in 18 USC §1462.

At the time, there was a lot of speculation that there was a defect in the
search warrant(s), and that this evidence of contraband was tossed-out as
a consequence of "the fruit of the poisoned tree" legal doctrine. (FWIW,
the search warrants have never come to light, to the best of my knowledge,
so I guess we'll never know.)

What ultimately led to Frank's downfall was Frank's reply to an email by a
purported fan, who was actually an undercover agent in the Middle District
of Georgia, asking where Frank's stories could be located.

Had Frank had ignored that email, the Georgia authorities would never had a
'jurisdictional hook' to put him on trial in Georgia, and Frank would have
remained a free man. (He might also have remained free, if he had taken
measures to protect himself, so that he could not be located/raided.)

[Jaxah]

On Wednesday, 18 October 2023 at 10:00:18 UTC+1, Santayana wrote:
> I have long believed that the reason that McCoy, Arthur and (very likely)
> Kuhlmeyer were all targeted was because they were low-hanging fruit. McCoy
> and Arthur both ran sites themselves, and I suspect the same is true of
> Kuhlmeyer. Neither McCoy nor Arthur took any particular pains to hide their
> identities -- both of them were easily located, and raided. (I suspect the
> same is true of Kuhlmeyer).

> --snip--

> I am not a great fan of the "Hope and pray they don't notice me" strategy.
> If the authorities /do/ notice you, you're screwed, unless you've taken
> appropriate countermeasures.

Hmmm... makes me think I should host the archive stuff on a foreign server, as just the hosting of it counts as 'distribution'.
If it's all in a place that isn't exactly USA authority friendly, it's a layer of protection, even if it's a warped layer of protection.

[Santayana]

On Wed, 18 Oct 2023 15:29:45 -0700 (PDT), Jaxah <fozz...@gmail.com> said
in Message-ID: <fb01f742-9de6-42e5...@googlegroups.com>:

When I am referring to 'appropriate countermeasures' I am referring to a
set of measures to protect /you/ as opposed to protecting the server. The
server and its' contents can be replaced; the idea is to prevent /you/ from
ending-up rotting in the American gulag known as the prison system.

What the Feds and the judicial system appear to have done is drastically
raised the cost for non-compliance with this law by imposing lengthy prison
terms.

It has now reached the point where running a site hosting stories that the
government doesn't like can potentially attract criminal penalties that
were once only imposed for drug-dealing or running an underground drug
market! (Case in point: Mr. Double - 20 years for 4 stories at 5yrs each,
to be served /consecutively/).

FWIW, I recall reading remarks to the effect that the FBI was even going
after some of Mr. Double's customers/downloaders.

You'll notice with the Arthur and Kuhlmeyer prosecutions, that the Feds are
going on about 'child obscenity websites'. This is the new terminology that
they're using. Most people, when they hear 'child obscenity' conflate this
with 'child pornography' -- and I believe that this is the /intent/ behind
the use of this specific terminology.

A number of story sites are now no longer permitting written material where
the age of the characters is depicted as under 18 years of age. A couple of
sites (like Kristen's board) have actually had their hosting yanked out
from under them on that basis. (Their hosting was only restored upon making
a promise to their hosting providers to remove any underage material from
public view, and cease accepting any new materials involving underage
characters.)

I suspect you're going to be forced to host this material on a Tor Hidden
service, if for no other reason than to protect yourself and your readers.

Right now, the European Parliament is mulling-over the idea of what has
been labelled 'chatcontrol' -- this is one of the most dangerous proposals
I have seen in my lifetime. Here is a summary from European Parliament MEP
Patrick Breyer:

The End of the Privacy of Digital Correspondence

The EU Commission proposes to oblige providers to search all private
chats, messages, and emails automatically for suspicious content --
generally and indiscriminately. The stated aim: To prosecute child
sexual exploitation material (CSEM). The result: Mass surveillance
by means of fully automated real-time surveillance of messaging and
chats and the end of privacy of digital correspondence.

Other aspects of the proposal include ineffective network blocking,
screening of personal cloud storage including private photos, mandatory
age verification resulting in the end of anonymous communication,
appstore censorship and excluding minors from the digital world.

https://www.patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/chat-control/


Patrick Breyer is an MEP representing the Pirate Party in Germany. He and
his allies are hoping they can stop this, but right now it's a coin-toss as
to which side will prevail. You can bet that, should this pass, the U.S.
government, and Canadian governments will follow suit. The UK has already
passed its' Online Safety Bill, which in some ways, is even /worse/ than
what has been proposed in the EU.

Chatcontrol has not even passed yet in the European Parliament, but memos
have already surfaced from within EuroPol that suggest the the law be used
not only to search-for/suppress CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material) but also
that its' use be expanded to other areas of policing:

In the same meeting, Europol proposed that detection be expanded to
other crime areas beyond CSAM, and suggested including them in the
proposed regulation. It also requested the inclusion of other elements
that would ensure another EU law in the making, the Artificial
Intelligence Act, would not limit the “use of AI tools for
investigations”.

https://balkaninsight.com/2023/09/29/europol-sought-unlimited-data-access-in-online-child-sexual-abuse-regulation/

Some of the discussions held in the European Parliament have dealt with the
scanning of email/text messages and presumably all other traffic to detect
'child grooming'. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure out
that these measures will end-up classifying any fictional text involving
underage characters as 'child grooming'.

Some of European Commission President Ylva Johansson's supporters want
these 'chatcontrol' proposals passed into law by the end of this year.

IMO, there has never been a more dangerous time to run a site like ASSTR
than now.

[Kairu Hakubi]

> IMO, there has never been a more dangerous time to run a site like ASSTR
> than now.

Not yet. I would say there's never been a more important time for it.

[Santayana]

On Mon, 23 Oct 2023 20:59:31 -0700 (PDT), Kairu Hakubi <sixsided...@gmail.com>
said in Message-ID: <d1dbb62a-3f36-46aa...@googlegroups.com>:

>> IMO, there has never been a more dangerous time to run a site like ASSTR
>> than now.
>

> Not yet ...

If these proposed 'chatcontrol' measures go through, and furthermore spread
to multiple jurisdictions, it'll be even worse, yes. It would appear that
the UK is already a lost cause, but right now there is still hope -- however
slim it may be -- for the EU.

What I find particularly troubling is how the United States has gamed, even
perverted, the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) regime in in securing
the cooperation of various overseas jurisdictions in securing electronic
evidence against defendants put on trial in America for alleged violations
of American obscenity laws.

If memory serves, Mr. Double's server was hosted in the Netherlands, and
the U.S. government enlisted the help of the Dutch government using the
MLAT between the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the United States.

Similarly, with the latest successful prosecution of Ron Kuhlmeyer, the U.S.
authorities somehow managed to secure the cooperation of the authorities in
Belize, from where Kuhlmeyer allegedly ran his website.

I think all this has happened because of the successful conflation of child
abuse and child pornography with obscenity. After all, in the end what we're
talking about are just WORDS, whether they be on paper or in an electronic
format of some kind. It's ironic, isn't it? The Internet was supposed to
usher-in a new age of freedom, when what we're seeing is the beginning of a
new Dark Age.

> I would say there's never been a more important time for it.

I agree.

[Jaxah]

On Tuesday, 24 October 2023 at 12:13:14 UTC+1, Santayana wrote:
> What I find particularly troubling is how the United States has gamed, even
> perverted, the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) regime in in securing
> the cooperation of various overseas jurisdictions in securing electronic
> evidence against defendants put on trial in America for alleged violations
> of American obscenity laws.
>
> If memory serves, Mr. Double's server was hosted in the Netherlands, and
> the U.S. government enlisted the help of the Dutch government using the
> MLAT between the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the United States.
>
> Similarly, with the latest successful prosecution of Ron Kuhlmeyer, the U.S.
> authorities somehow managed to secure the cooperation of the authorities in
> Belize, from where Kuhlmeyer allegedly ran his website.

Yeah, hence my pondering of going with something like a Russian server. With the cooperation or lack thereof between the USA and Russia, it may be an ideal choice to host the archives there.

I think you're right though, the future of freedom is in the dark web.