January 16

Events

• Current events

• 1979 - Too young to die, but not too young to love - The singer Aaliyah Haughton was born on this date. She first became big news when it was reported that she had married singer R. Kelly when she was only 15 and that the marriage was hastily annulled due to her parents' objections. Kelly was also the producer of her first album, appropriately entitled Age Ain't Nothing But A Number. The song, written by Kelly, goes in part "Take my hand, and come with me / Let me show you to ecstasy / Boy be brave don't be afraid / 'Cause tonight we're gonna go all the way / ... / Age ain't nothing but a number." The scandal only served to help both of their careers. Sadly, Aaliyah died in 2001 at the age of 21 in a plane crash.

• 1998 - Not just a cut in jail time - On this date a judge in Illinois ruled that Jeffery Morse, a convicted child sex offender can have himself castrated in hopes of winning a lighter sentence and eliminating his sexual interest in children. "My client is hopeful this will be seen as the most tangible demonstration of remorse any individual could offer," said Paul Wharton, Morse's attorney. Morse volunteered to be castrated even before he was convicted of a 1996 attack on a 12 year old girl and an attempted attack in 1997 on an 11 year old girl. That request was opposed by the ACLU and denied by Judge Donald Hudson who said that he "isn't in the practice of playing Let's Make a Deal." Morse won the won the right to the surgury on appeal.

• 2001 - Smile! You could be the next page three boy! - The Fort Worth, Texas Police resumed printing the photographs of convicted sex offenders in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram on this date. They decided to start running the photographs again after determining that the public favored the move, Police Chief Ralph Mendoza said. Police officials said the state does not require them to run the photographs because they are available on the Internet at the Texas Department of Public Safety's Web site, but when people started asking for then to be printed in the Newspapers they agreed. The Police Department allocated about $80,000 in 2001 for the sex offender notices.

• 2001 - Censors desperately in need of an enema - Maverick comedy writer Robert Smigel, known to Saturday Night Live fans for his comics, including the Ambiguously Gay Duo got in trouble with TV censors for a segment of his Comedy Central series TV Funhouse. When it first ran, the segment was called "Porn For Kids" and showed portions of a porn movie with all the porn material removed. The opening of the segment, showed kids running through a field under the colorful title "Porn for Kids" and then showed them demanding "we want porn." When the segment was rebroadcast on this date, it was retitled "Porn For Everyone" and the images of the children were removed. It seems that someone at Comedy Central just has no sense of humor at all.

• 2001 - A 42 year old man and a 16 year old boy? That's not pedo. It's just normal. - A 42 year old Las Vegas narcotics detective, Vinten Hartung, was spared charges for having sex with a 16 year old boy, even though sex with a boy that age was a crime in Nevada. (The charge would have been soliciting a minor to engage in "the infamous crime against nature"). The prosecutors said their reason for forgoing charges was that "any such charges would be discriminatory toward homosexuals." Hartung, however continued to be investigated for the "lesser charge" (their words, folks) of "stalking" the boy. the complaint was filed, not by the boy, but by the boy's father. On this date the editorial writers in Nevada were all in a fluff about this case. One wrote "What consenting adults do in their private time is their own business, but the age differences make Hartung look like a sexual predator. In uniform, yet. Metro must be very proud." Another, speaking of Hartung, wrote that "this creep is -- a pedophile. The 16-year-old boy is a child.... What they are doing, in effect and among other things, is legalizing child molestation." Ultimately, the detective resigned and all charges were dropped.