At Blog@Newsarama, Jeff Trexler presents a sober analysis of the law and Handley’s legal options, and explains exactly why a plea bargain probably was the right move for him—and why the law in question is unlikely to be overturned.
UPDATE: Trexler adds some advice for readers and retailers.
A commenter at Japanator claims to be a friend of Handley’s and explains the logic behind the plea bargain. However, the commenter is anonymous and this is the internet, so some skepticism may be in order.
Heidi hosts an interesting discussion of the value of protecting unsavory content in the comments section of The Beat.
Neil Gaiman, who staunchly defended Handley’s right to possess unsavory content, is disappointed.
Christopher Butcher points out how easy it would be for any of us to violate the PROTECT act.
Gary Tyrrell nails it at Fleen:
Overzealous prosecutor + some of the links over there to the right [webcomics] = you in federal prison for up to 15 years.
Some other coverage and reactions from around the web:
Anime News Network
Tom Spurgeon at The Comics Reporter
Alexander Case at Dreams of the Red King
ICv2
Julie at The Manga Maniac Cafe
Kevin Melrose at Robot 6
Jyuichi at Wakeless Days
UPDATE 2: Oh, so that’s why my hits went through the roof: Metafilter is on the case.
The thing is no one wants to go to prison. It’s all well and good for people to say he should have fought on, but the fact is it’s his life that would end up in prison, not them.
If it was me, and i was offered a deal that would have kept me out of prison, i’m sorry to say i’d snap their hands off.
The sad thing is the repercussions of this are going to send shockwaves through the entire manga community. And i can see a lot more people being arrested. It makes the prosecutors look good to catch psedosex offenders (as in people who look like them, but arent) than to actually go out and catch real ones.
Where do you draw the line though? Will owning copies of Sundome, Ikki Tousen, Battle Club and a slew of other such titles get me arrested. What about Kodomo no Jikan, Strawberry Panic and Kanadzuki no Miko (the last 2 having rape in them)
As i said though, it’s easy for the likes of Gaiman and the CBLDF to sit there and say they’re disapointed, but it’s not them in the dock, it’s not them facing 15years in prison. I wonder how they would have acted if it was them in the dock.
The big thing is where do they go from here? I can see this falling into obscurity and being forgoten with months, and IMO that would be a travesty. The likes of Gaiman and the CBLDF need to officially join forces and make a public fight of it. Get down and dirty with them in the press. Will they do that? I doubt it.
Now I wonder what the effects could be on publishers. For example, will Tokyopop reconsider dropping Suppli, since that one has sex scenes between full-grown adults (they’re not even in college, they’re workers at an advertising firm!) instead of pandering to the high-school-uniform-fetish crowd?
Meanwhile, I’ve also seen the “speak up for them now so they’ll speak up for you when it’s your turn” argument about this case.
It reminds me a bit of the reaction to sexual harassment at last year’s SDCC. Many people did speak up against the harassment (see http://bullyscomics.blogspot.com/2008/08/serious-note.html and http://www.google.com/search?as_lq=http%3A%2F%2Fbullyscomics.blogspot.com%2F2008%2F08%2Fserious-note.html ). OTOH, I wonder how many of the fans of rape-of-little-kids manga spoke up against the harassment too and how many thought “no fair they’re picking on lonely guys!!!” instead.
So, is this a case of “speak up for them now so they’ll speak up for you when it’s your turn” or a case of “they didn’t speak up for you back when it was your turn so they shouldn’t expect you to speak up for them now”?
Well written, Tiamet’s Disciple. He originally refused to sign the plea. Lawyer managed to talk to him without any one being privy to phone call as in the past. Lawyer blew off client’s concerns as legal mumbo jumbo. Lawyer thought he could get only 3-24 months in prison as opposed to 15 yrs. Prosecutor pushing for more. Plea not accepted by judge yet. If could find a way to withdraw plea, he would do it/Lawyer not show up for plea but sent “no nothing” sub. Guy was left hanging. After the fact, the guy is learning how much support he has. He was barred from any anime site and not allowed to “Chat” with anyone. His computer is being monitored. CBLDF isn’t shrugging this off. They are still investigating the situation and hope to produce some educational material so all of you out there will know what to watch out for. Cartoons for bleeps sake, who would have thought. And only a very small part of his collection is considered obscene. People who commit actual physical crimes against any one of any age get less time in prison than this guy might get. It is a travesty. While no child pornography was involved, sentencing will be based on child pornography guidelines, how stupid is that. Good luck to all of you. You can read more accurate details on http://www.comipress.com.
[...] lot of coverage and discussion about Christopher Handley and his guilty plea for possessing obscene material. More here, here, [...]
[...] some more recent e-mails from Handley’s mother at his blog. (It looks like his mother posted this comment as well.) From Ms. Handley’s e-mails (Thorn is convinced it’s really her), it seems [...]
Finally people are reacting to this, it seems nobody wanted to say anything because they figured it would get thrown out, or they’re all “oh well the CBLDF so it’ll be fine!” But everyone’s waking up! Sad about the plea but glad about that part.
Basically, if this leads to it being declared an unjust law then it doesn’t matter if he pled guilty to it.