Yet another media figure and child porn
Larry Mathews in the Washington, DC area. Kurt Eichenwald in Dallas and New York. Bernie Ward in San Francisco. All involved in child porn scandals while working in the media. And now there’s Dennis Melanson, in Canada. His story has been covered extensively but superficially by the Canadian press, including the CBC. The clip I’m posting, from Canada’s DAILY GLEANER, is the most detailed coverage available (for the web version, click here):
Judge finds former TV host guilty
By MICHAEL STAPLES
staples.michael@dailygleaner.com
Wednesday February 27th, 2008
Appeared on page A1
A former Fredericton TV talk show host found guilty in provincial court Tuesday of accessing child pornography will return for sentencing next month.
Dennis Melanson appeared upset after Judge Graydon Nicholas delivered his verdict. He could receive a jail sentence when he returns to court March 13 at 1:30 p.m.
Melanson, who was charged with accessing child pornography between Jan. 1, 2005, and May 10, 2005, admitted during his trial that he visited child pornography sites on a computer at Rogers Television during the timeline in question.
But he said he was researching the subject as a possible topic for his call-in talk show.
Nicholas said he could accept that argument up to a point, but not after February 2005, the date when Melanson talked to an RCMP officer about child pornography.
Sgt. Jacques Boucher, a cybercrime instructor at the Canada Police College, testified last summer that he appeared on Melanson’s TV show, Melanson Live, in February 2005 to speak about Internet safety.
He said that after the show, he and Melanson discussed briefly the possibility of him returning for another episode to talk about child pornography.
“In my opinion, the surfing the defendant did up to (the) RCMP interview could be educational,” Nicholas said.
Up to that point, the Crown failed to prove its case, Nicholas said. But the fact that Melanson continued to surf the Net for child-porn sites up until May went beyond the desired research, the judge said.
“It is my opinion, the defendant is guilty,” Nicholas said.
He said his decision was a difficult one because of a lack of case law.
Other than the Sharp Decision in 2001, which said there was no accessing child pornography unless it was for a purpose of education, nothing else was available.
Defining how the topic could be applied to education was unclear, he said.
“(There’s) not much case law as to what is an educational purpose.”
In bringing down his verdict, Nicholas warned the public of the consequences of going into areas such as child-porn sites that are forbidden under the Criminal Code of Canada.
Appropriate legal advice should be obtained, Nicholas said.
Melanson, meanwhile, offered no comment as he exited the courtroom and quickly left the building.
But his lawyer, Howard Peters of Fredericton, said his client was disappointed.
“I thought the evidence was clear, following the discussion with Mr. Watters and the RCMP that Mr. Melanson had given the appropriate parties the heads up that he was doing this research or intending to do this research for his shows, which was educational,” Peters said.
Fredericton lawyer Daniel Watters told the court during testimony in November that he encouraged the former host of Melanson Live to do a show on child pornography and that he could surf the Net to see how many images there were, but not to download anything.
Peters agreed there wasn’t much case law and that could be used as grounds for appeal.
The defence lawyer said he wouldn’t do anything differently if he had the trial to do over.
“We knew it was going to come down to a question of this definition or interpretation of education.”
Peters said under the Criminal Code of Canada, such a verdict mandates a jail sentence, but that he would be arguing for a conditional sentence — especially taking into consideration the type of evidence that came forward.
Crown prosecutor Kathy Gregory said she was pleased with the verdict.