View from a Rhino House: tooled-up

In the “land-of-the-free” a man accused of texting an unsolicited picture of his tattooed penis to a woman did not commit a crime under Georgia state law, the state’s Supreme Court ruled yesterday.

Chuck Warren faced being banged-up for 3 years after being indicted under a 1970’s Georgia law that makes it illegal to send unsolicited nude photographs by mail without a proper warning on the outside of the envelope. (Wouldn’t you just love to see an envelope that is legal?)

Lawyers claimed he texted the picture of his tattooed penis in October 2012 to a woman who then complained to police. According to prosecutors, Warren’s genitals were tattooed with the phrase, “STRONG E nuf 4 A MAN BUT Made 4 A WOMAN.” (So not great at spelling in addition to a fairly dubious choice of hobby – but the real question, on everybody’s lips, is – what font size?)

The Georgia Supreme Court said the state law did not cover photos “sent electronically through a cell phone text message, “ & the judges dismissed the criminal charge in a unanimous, if smirking, decision.

The defendant’s attorney also challenged the existing law on the ground that it violated his client’s First Amendment guarantee of free speech (the Founding Fathers must be turning in their graves), but the court did not address that constitutional minefield. Now if he’d had the Declaration of Independence tattooed there he’d pretty much be a shoe-in for the mid-term elections with his own You Tube channel.

“Come on, you didn’t really think I was going to post-up a picture of it, did you?”