From www.news.aol.com – A Tennessee man is facing charges of aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor for what authorities say are three pictures — none of them featuring an actual child’s body.
Instead, according to testimony presented at Michael Wayne Campbell’s preliminary hearing in Chattanooga, Tennessee, on Wednesday, the photos feature the faces of three young girls placed on the nude bodies of adult females, CNN affiliate WDEF reported.
Hamilton County Det. Michael Cox said Campbell told authorities “he wanted to see what they would look like as adults,” according to WDEF.
Two of the faces were of local girls — a 10-year-old and 12-year-old, the station reported. The third face appears to be Miley Cyrus, 16, star of Disney’s popular television series “Hannah Montana” and its big-screen adaptation, “Hanna Montana: The Movie,” according to WDEF.
Investigators do not believe Campbell had any contact with the three girls, but “when you have the face of a small child affixed to a nude body of a mature woman, it’s going to be the state’s position that this is for sexual gratification and that this is simulated sexual activity,” Assistant District Attorney Dave Denny said during last week’s hearing.
Cases like Campbell’s present a unique legal issue. The U.S. Supreme Court in 2002 ruled that “virtual child pornography,” in which no children were actually harmed, is protected speech and does not constitute a crime.
Since then, “more and more of these guys are using morphed images, image manipulations” in an attempt to circumvent prosecution, Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, said Wednesday.
Such attempts are not always successful, Allen said, as charges can still be filed under obscenity laws or other statutes. Also, other avenues can be pursued when the faces used are those of real, identifiable people, he said.
“We see it all the time,” Allen said. “It makes it harder for law enforcement. It makes it tougher for prosecutors.”
“It’s definitely on the increase,” said Justin Fitzsimmons, a former prosecutor and senior attorney with the National Center for the Prosecution of Child Abuse, part of the National District Attorneys’ Association. “People are trying to come up with creative ways to continue to sexually exploit children using digital evidence.”