Current Status Introducing Body:Senate Bill Number:1522 Primary Sponsor:Mitchell Committee Number:11 Type of Legislation:GB Subject:Indecent crime material to minors Residing Body:Senate Current Committee:Judiciary Computer Document Number:DKA/3878.AL Introduced Date:Apr 28, 1992 Last History Body:Senate Last History Date:Apr 28, 1992 Last History Type:Introduced, read first time, referred to Committee Scope of Legislation:Statewide All Sponsors:Mitchell Type of Legislation:General Bill
Bill Body Date Action Description CMN
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1522 Senate Apr 28, 1992 Introduced, read first time, 11
referred to Committee
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TO AMEND THE CODE OF LAWS OF SOUTH CAROLINA, 1976, BY ADDING SECTIONS 16-15-150 AND 16-15-160 SO AS TO DEFINE AND PROHIBIT DISSEMINATING INDECENT CRIME MATERIAL TO MINORS AND TO PROVIDE PENALTIES.
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of South Carolina:
SECTION 1. The 1976 Code is amended by adding:
"Section 16-15-150. The following definitions are applicable to Section 16-15-160 of this chapter:
(1) `Minor' means a person less than seventeen years old.
(2) `Trading card' means a card, souvenir card, playing card, or game card commonly known as a trading card.
(3) `Heinous crime' means murder, assault, kidnapping, arson, burglary, robbery, rape, or other sexual offense.
(4) `Heinous criminal' means a person who has been convicted of a heinous crime or who has been found not criminally responsible by reason of mental disease or defect for criminal conduct concerning the commission of a heinous crime.
(5) `Harmful to minors' means that quality of any description or representation in whatever form of a heinous crime, an element of a heinous crime, or a heinous criminal, when it:
(a) considered as a whole, appeals to the depraved interest of minors in crime; and
(b) is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community as a whole with respect to what is suitable material for minors; and
(c) considered as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, and scientific value for minors.
Section 16-15-160. (A) A person is guilty of disseminating indecent criminal materials to minors when, with knowledge of its character and content, he sells or loans to a minor for monetary consideration any trading card which depicts a heinous crime, an element of a heinous crime, or a heinous criminal and which is harmful to minors. Upon conviction, the person must be imprisoned not more than one year or fined not more than two hundred dollars.
(B) A person who engages in the conduct proscribed by subsection (A) of this section is presumed to do so with knowledge of the character and content of the material sold or loaned.
(C) In a prosecution for disseminating indecent crime material to minors, it is an affirmative defense that:
(1) the defendant had reasonable cause to believe that the minor involved was seventeen years old or more; and
(2) the minor exhibited to the defendant a draft card, driver's license, birth certificate, or other official or apparently official document purporting to establish that the minor was seventeen years old or more."
SECTION 2. This act takes effect upon approval by the Governor.