IYSS

Public Order/Sexual Offences

What are public order offences?

These are mainly offences that affect other people in a way that could harm, endanger, embarrass or offend them.  This could include such acts as:

• making racist comments
• using obscene language
• exposing your genitals
• taking inappropriate photos of someone without their knowledge
• spitting
• littering
• begging

Public places are basically anywhere where members of the public are present or permitted to be.  Penalties for public order offences range from fines to jail sentences, depending on the seriousness of the offence.  

THINK BEFORE YOU ACT!

Pranks can also have serious consequences, for example "mooning", which is when people expose their bottom.  You may do this as a joke but if you are reported, charged and found guilty you could end up being placed on the sex offenders register, which is a severe punishment for what started out as a joke.

Sexting

Sexting is the term used for sending messages and images of a sexual nature via camera phones.  This practice is becoming quite commonplace among young people, and many of them do it without considering the serious consequences.  Here is a fictitious situation, which demonstrates the potential seriousness of sexting:

Sara, aged 14, sends a sexual photo of herself to her boyfriend Peter, using her camera phone
Potentially Sara is now guilty of distributing child pornography and Peter is potentially guilty of being in possession of child pornography

Sara dumps Peter and out of revenge he sends the photo to his school friends
Peter is now also guilty of distributing child pornography and his friends are guilty of possession

Peter decides to upload the photo to a social networking profile where his photos are visible to the public
Peter is now in breach of website terms, and is also guilty of distributing child pornography .  Those photos are now available to the general public and paedophiles are well known for browsing profiles with poor privacy settings.  Sara could unwittingly become the subject of child pornography which could be distributed to strangers.

For more information about public order offences click here