Sex could send teens to prison

All right, moms and dads: If you weren't paying attention when Chad Muns was

arrested, you'd better wake up now. Your teens' sexual activities could send

them to prison for a long time.

Columbia County deputies last week arrested three Evans High School students

- two of them 16, the other 15 - and charged them with aggravated child

molestation. The charges were filed after parents said their four 13- and

14-year-old girls had sex with the three boys, who sneaked into the girls'

sleepover parties, said Capt. Steve Morris.

"We were advised by the parents of the four juvenile girls that their

daughters had performed oral sex on three males," Morris says. Though the

parents of two of the girls didn't want to prosecute, the parents of one

girl did. After an investigation, the boys were charged with aggravated

child molestation - and could go to prison for at least 10 years.

Read that again, moms and dads: These boys, if convicted as adults, will

grow into adulthood before they are again free - and then they will be

publicly stigmatized, branded as "child molesters," their faces forever

archived in police sex-offender registries.

All because of what they no doubt saw as harmless sex play.

Muns' case, which is more complicated, has shed a spotlight on the criminal

side of teen sexual activities not only because he's the son of a school

board member, but because the 19-year-old faces 16 indictments for various

sexual charges, including aggravated child molestation.

This issue is deadly serious, but it seems not enough parents - or their

teens - are aware of the stiff penalties. "There is no gray area," Morris

says.

In last week's arrests, we're talking about 13- and 14-year-old victims, and

15- and 16-year-old offenders. The law calls for a charge of child

molestation because the girls are under 16 and not legally able to consent

to sex. And because the boys received oral sex - sodomy, under Georgia law -

the charge is upgraded to aggravated child molestation. (Strangely enough,

if the teens had intercourse instead, the charge would be only misdemeanor

statutory rape.)

And while the girls are young enough to be victims of child molestation, the

boys are old enough to be considered adults. Georgia law allows kids as

young as 13 to be charged as an adult if they commit one of the so-called

"seven deadly sins." That includes aggravated child molestation, which

carries a mandatory 10-year minimum prison sentence.

Harsh? You'd better believe it. The high-profile Marcus Dixon case in Rome,

Ga., has drawn nationwide attention since the star high school athlete

received a 10-year sentence for having sex with a girl at school.

But it can happen here, too: a Columbia County student who received oral sex

on a school bus went to prison in 2001 for aggravated child molestation, and

Muns is awaiting trial on similar charges.

There will undoubtedly be more such cases. State lawmakers certainly aren't

going to ease the penalties and open themselves to charges that they're

friendly to sex predators, even though they know the law wasn't intended to

forever brand sexually active teens as violent criminals.

The solution? If more parents don't want to see their boys sent to prison,

they'd damn well better warn them about the consequences of failing to

control their hormones.