New York Ponders Bill to Punish Those Who Upload Videos of Crime on Internet

The most of the videos uploaded to the Internet's most popular video site YouTube are harmless vignettes of the best and worst of the lives of regular people.

In any case, whenever you allow user-generated content, you're bound to find some videos that are inappropriate, and even some of illegal activity. Clearly, some of YouTube's attention seekers have a distorted idea of what makes an amusing video, or may not even realize that what they're doing may be illegal. Up till now, videos that fell under this category could be reported to YouTube's vigilant staff and be removed for violating the user agreement.

But a new bill in the New York state legislature would instate criminal penalties for posting videos of illegal activities on Internet sites like YouTube and MySpace. The bill would create and aggravated crime of "unlawful violent recording" that would bring one-and-a-half to four years in prison, plus fines, on top of any other charges and/or convictions brought concerning the crimes themselves.

Additionally, the bill also calls for the criminalization of convincing others (whether by bribe, threat, or other means) to engage in violent acts for the purpose of recording and distribution, sources report.

One example cited by lawmakers features several teenage girls beating up a 16-year-old classmate, leaving her unconscious. The Florida girls face a variety of criminal charges for the actual beating committed, but none for the public distribution of their crime.

Posting videos online has become easy, thanks to portable digital recording technology as well as user-friendly platforms like the YouTube interface; new laws regulating this relatively recent phenomenon have yet to be made. It is this absence that the New York legislators are hoping to remedy.

Specifically, the law seeks to curb the self-advertisement that some criminals get a rush from; one California-based forensic psychologist likened the behavior of recording and publicly posting criminal acts on the Internet to the practice of some serial killers to collect newspaper clippings about their crimes. In other words, these stunts could be seen as intended for self-glorification.

However, New York legislators have identified a different effect than mere narcissism feel that effectively victimizing a person twice is too severe an action not to go unpunished.

In all, the proposed legislation illustrates the unique and ever-morphing role played by digital technology in our lives and in our criminal justice system.

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