A Colorado TV station has been accused of unauthorized broadcast of a teenaged boy's genitalia that was taken from an uploaded YouTube video. The boy from North Carolina is asking $1 million in damages in his allegations of violations of federal child pornography laws, invasion of privacy and negligence among others. Also named co-accused in the lawsuit are the reporter and the station's affiliate companies, NBC and Comcast.
The incident happened two years ago when the teen was only 14 years old and was living in Colorado. His identity is being withheld as the boy is still a minor. He was being blackmailed with a cell phone video that was put online.
According to Techworm, his father's girlfriend contacted KOAA to report the boy's predicament. The station sent a local reporter, Matthew Prichard, to the family's Pueblo Colorado home to interview the boy and also to film the sensitive video. According to the lawsuit, the boy's father specifically told Prichard not to mention his son's name in the report.
KOAA aired the report on February 24, 2014 and also posted it online with the offending images. The lawsuit, which is now known as Holden v. KOAA, says that the report showed a collected thumbnail image of the online video on YouTube. Contrary to the father's request, the boy's name was shown directly above the clip during its broadcast reports Daily Mail. It is not clear why the lawsuit was filed two years after the incident.
Evan Pappas, the president of KOAA said that the topic of the dangers of sexting has been delved extensively in many of their news stories reports Ars Technica. He claims that it was the alleged victim's father who requested them to ran the story of his son being blackmailed over a cell phone video. However, since the case is now pending litigation, he cannot discuss the specifics of the lawsuit. He has promised though to defend themselves against what to him are unfounded accusations.
The boy's lawyer Matthew Schneide meanwhile said he was not authorized by his client to discuss the case. Neither has Prichard, who so far has not released a statement regarding the lawsuit.
