11/03/06 (GA):
Defense Expert Rejected As Internet Porn Conviction Upheld
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A former Georgia teacher blamed computer viruses for altering his Web sites and uploading child porn images. Michael Aaron O'Keefe once was an eighth-grade math teacher at Lee County High School in Albany, GA.
In addition to his day job, O'Keefe created Web sites with names like "modelquest" and "hotweens," entreating visitors to submit "hard-core images" through e-mail.
However, he claimed to be an anti-child-pornography crusader who developed Web sites to entrap child predators in order to turn their identities over to law enforcement authorities.
O'Keefe claimed his vigilante efforts were thwarted when the Web sites allegedly were hacked into and altered by computer viruses to include a selection of child porn images.
In May 2003 federal authorities raided his home and indicted him a year later. He was charged with the receipt, possession and advertising of child pornography.
During the trial, O'Keefe testified in his defense and claimed that he began gathering evidence against child predators on the Internet because of an incident involving a family member in 1990. After trying to report predators to the police anonymously, he claimed to have decided to strike out on his own.
As for the child porn and the malware, the defense called Jeff Fischbach, an expert witness who examined the computer. Fischbach stated that he found indications of malware on O'Keefe's computer, which the court described as permitting "another user to control the computer by remote and give the appearance that the computer's owner performed actions on the computer that the owner actually did not perform."
Prosecutors argued that the explanation of a virus was "far-fetched" and "hypothetical." James Fottrell--part of the High Technology Investigative Unit within the Justice Department's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section--testified that he did find two viruses on O'Keefe's computer. But, Fottrell said, they weren't capable of "downloading and uploading child pornography and sending out advertisements."
A jury found O'Keefe guilty of all counts and the trial judge sentenced him to 17 1/2 years in prison. The 11th Circuit rejected his appeal, which argued that prosecutors violated his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent by discussing O'Keefe's failure to report his activities to law enforcement and also claimed that the government engaged in prosecutorial misconduct during its closing argument.
© X-Pro 2006
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