Tennessee lawmakers take aim at outlawing sexting for people under 18

Two Williamson County Republicans have led the effort on behalf of state prosecutors and juvenile court judges to make it against state law for minors to send or keep sexually explicit messages on smartphones, a legislative effort that soon is expected to go to Gov. Bill Haslam.

Sen. Jack Johnson and House Majority Leader Glen Casada, both of Franklin, have sponsored legislation that will likely cross the legislative finish line next week, which would create a status offense for minors who send or keep explicit images on their phones.

The final full Senate vote was delayed Wednesday over some language differences between the Senate version and House version, which cleared the lower chamber unanimously on Monday.

Johnson said the bill was brought to him by the District Attorney's Conference, the state's professional organization for prosecutors which often advocates for legislation, and juvenile court judges who Johnson said want to be able to charge minors with offenses lower than a felony, which is what the current law requires.

"There's nothing in the (state) code to deal with a 17-year-old kid who sends a picture to her 17-year-old boyfriend and vice versa," he said.

What prosecutors and judges want, Johnson said, is to be able to punish those teens for sending those photos "so they don't have to charge them with a felony and ruin their life."

Johnson said there have been a growing number of cases where young people have shared images containing nudity or other sexually explicit material with others and then is shared again and again.

Children under age 18 would not be subject to the new law if they did not solicit the image, deleted it or if they reported it to their parents or guardians.

A status offense is not a criminal charge under state law, but children who violate the law would be referred to the Department of Children Services and potentially sent to shelter care. The state law defines it as an "unruly act," similar to truancy, Johnson said.

The measure comes as mobile apps like Snapchat have exploded in popularity particularly among younger users and have offered its users the ability to send images and text messages to others that expire or are deleted. Users can take screenshots of the images and store them on their devices.

Snapchat and even regular text messaging apps allow users to send images to recipients without their consent. If someone were to screenshot an image with explicit material, that would subject them to the offense.

More than 70 percent of Snapchat users are under 34 years old and 30 percent of millennial internet users say they use Snapchat regularly, according to Omnicore, a digital marketing agency.

Requests for comment from Snap, Inc., the parent company of Snapchat, weren’t immediately returned.

The measure has faced almost no opposition as it has moved through the legislature, with unanimous support from both Democrats and Republicans.

"It's good bill," Johnson said.

Jake Lowary covers Tennessee politics and state government for the USA Today Network. Reach him at 931-237-1583 or follow him on Twitter @JakeLowary.