back to article Man blames cat for child porn downloads

A Florida man accused of downloading more than 1,000 images of child pornography is blaming the offense on his cat, according to published reports. Keith Griffin of Jensen Beach is charged with 10 counts of child porn possession after detectives found the images on his home computer, the Associated Press reports. …

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  1. jake Silver badge

    I might believe the dude ...

    ... if it was kitty pr0n.

    That said, my cats have managed to post unfinished comments here on ElReg, on occasio

  2. Santax

    lol

    are you kitting me?

  3. JB

    You couldn't make it up....

    ...though it certainly sounds like he did!

  4. David 146
    Gates Halo

    How did they find him in the first place?

    Unless it was a sting operation website (unlikely) the cops don't investigate you unless there's some other lead. I understand most child porn downloaders get caught because they were foolish enough to use their own credit-card information to purchase it, or that someone else reported them after seeing their computer. The AP source doesn't mention this (rather crucial) detail.

    /SaintBill because IE doesn't report what sites you visit to the feds

  5. Mike 119
    FAIL

    Wowza

    Heard some crap excuses in my time, but that ranks up there with the worst.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Cat? Porn? It's just too obvious...

    ... I got my coat before I started typing

  7. This post has been deleted by its author

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    move over...

    move over pedobear, pedocat is on the job

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Wow...

    Talk about pussy getting you into trouble.

    Wonder what the lolcats would make of this?

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    David 146

    He was downloading music. So i would guess he was using a Gnutella based P2P client like Limewire.

    Theres lots of CP on there.

  11. James O'Brien
    WTF?

    Words fail me for this story

    Im going to go drool in a corner

  12. John Miles
    Joke

    re: How did they find him in the first place?

    Obviously the cat had been using his credit card!

  13. M man
    Joke

    Ok its getting beyond a joke!

    They laze around the house eating our food, even though, unlike dogs they can get thier own, commanding us to do thier bidding with thier sub sonic purrs, and now they are using OUR broadband to D/L thier Pr0n! they dont even offer to pay toward the Broadband bill! !!!!111111eventyone

  14. dl
    FAIL

    RE: How did they find him

    Maybe the cat also shopped him to the cops to cover its tracks?

  15. fluffy

    I like how "downloading music" was his defense

    Did he just self-incriminate?

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Boffin

    i can haz cp?

    Clearly this matter will not rest until the Internet has an image macro of it.

  17. LaeMi Qian
    FAIL

    Iz on yr pootr getn u in trubl

    Iz on yr pootr getn u in trubl

  18. Mark Monaghan
    Coffee/keyboard

    Get out claws er clause?

    I don't believe this scenario for a moment.

    Any half decent cat would have arranged for a dog to take the blame.

    What happened? Did he forget to feed the cat?

  19. northern monkey
    Joke

    That's what you get...

    ..if you ignore your cat's repeatedly 'requests' for feeding. Though the severity of the cat's actions suggests that he'd not fed it in quite a while, the worst I've heard in the past was a little bit of insurance fraud and some drug planting - for a cat to go so far as downloading 1000 images to frame their owner neglect of the highest degree.

    Perhaps he deserved it!

  20. Christopher Martin

    Cats are the scourge of the earth

    I'm not at all surprised the poor man's cat was using his credit card. Cats are lazy freeloaders, all of them. And now pedophiles to boot.

    http://www.picturesforsadchildren.com/index.php?comicID=162

  21. Cliff

    lolcats might be a good angle here

    We all know no cat proud enough to prefix his or herself with 'lol' can spell, so maybe the cat was trying to type something innocent into a search engine, but misspelt the search term and ended up at a very un-lol site?

  22. Hardcastle
    FAIL

    Kitty Pr0n

    Let's give the wanker the benefit of the doubt and say that it was the inadvertent tap of kitty paws that magically caused pr0n to appear on his hard drive... If the dude knew his cat jumps on the keyboard when he steps away, he should have had a keyboard locker app installed on his machine so when the cat jumps on the keys, the pr0n wouldnt have cruised in. If only he would have been running Linux, he could have snagged such an app from the repos quick, free and Free.

    However, I'm still sober (for now) so to me, believing this tomfoolery is like believing that Baldmer is a Linux advocate. Dude probably floats air biscuits and blames it on the dog too...

    ..."Your honor, this is a great misunderstanding. Most blokes have pets that behave. I get stuck with flatulating canines and Pr0n snagging felines, and I'm so locked into the Winhole Experience that I don't know how to make the keyboard pussyproof" LMAO

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Big Brother

    Bad move on his part

    Is this guy MAD, he should fess up to the LESSER child pr0n charge immediately, he'll probably not even do time for a first offence...

    Whereas the way things are in the US now, If they do him for illegally downloading music his ancestors will still be coughing up to the RIAA two or three generations down the line..!

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Hah

    What an interesting commentary, once upon a time you were innocent until proven guilty. Not any more.

  25. h 6
    Thumb Down

    Something about

    A 1000 monkeys pecking at typewriters...?

  26. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    What a perverted cat

    Maybe they should be putting away the cat -- it sounds like a real pervert.

    But seriously, they DO need to make sure (whether him or the cat) did not put some porn-sucking virus onto his computer *ASAP*, before his life is ruined even more. My cats *have* made my computer do ridiculous things -- I have an app I click on specifically because it ignores keyboard input, and they'd still manage to jump on the mouse first! I scold them a bit when I catch them stepping on it, so now they are very good about walking around the keys though. And recall unlike a proper OS (Linux, OSX, other UNIXes) Windows doesn't have an execute bit on files so anything named *.exe will run -- making it easy for a cat to launch some rogue file.

    I find this very unlikely, though, in which case obviously the cat didn't download child pornography over 1000 times.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    Good Kitty....

    Just a well trained cat. Here, have a treat.

  28. frank ly
    Coffee/keyboard

    Cats....devious

    My grandmother's cat collected her pension for two months after she had died and then managed to put the blame on my uncle. They are devious creatures.

  29. ChessGeek

    Oh, um...

    I'd post a comment, but I think I'd better go feed the cats.

  30. David Barrett

    Well...

    That's a coincidence last week my dog nicked my car and went through a speed camera at 40 in a 30 area!

    And the my hampster started making dirty calls... I won't even tell you what the gold fish and rabbits have been up to.

    It's an animal consipircybi tell you!

  31. David Barrett

    Filed under

    C:\users\mr tinkles\downloads\private stuff\porn\

    if it's there the obviously it has to have been the cat.

  32. Anonymous John

    Don't believe it.

    How can a cat take a computer to PC World?

    Although there's a lot that can be done by pressing keys at random (by a cat sleeping in a nice warm laptop keyboard).

    I had to delete dozens of duplicate desktop icons once. And on another occasion, found that one cat had managed to open Outlook Express and compose an email.

  33. Charles Smith

    Pussy looks at Pawn?

    Never be unkind to your pussy and make sure you keyboard has a paw lock device.

  34. This post has been deleted by its author

  35. hi_robb
    Joke

    Well...

    I've a feline he want be getting out anytime soon

    /Gets coats and exits stage left

  36. Tony Barnes

    What a twat

    Seriously, I hope he gets torn a new one by the judge...

    God, unless somehow the judge falls for it and gives the cat the chair?!?!?

    It is America after all...

  37. stu 4
    Joke

    hairless cat ?

    now... if it was a 'sphynx' cat.. u know the hairless cats.... perhaps it had just done a few good search for 'hairless pus...

    yeh u can fill in the rest.

  38. Sceptical Bastard

    In defence of cats

    Hi, I am a cat. My servant, Sceptical Bastard (or SB as I call him when I deign to address him at all) is taking a shower so I've commandeered his keyboard to defend us felines.

    To all you humantard commentators dissing us cats, I say FOAD. Do you want to be over-run with mice and birds? No? Then shut the fuck up.

    Do you two-legged furless fuckwits seriously think we'd be interested in looking at pictures of you abusing your kittens? No. It is quite obvious that my brother in America was exacting revenge for some insult or neglect. And good luck to him!

    Any more whingeing from you lot and there'll be fur flying! And - if you read this - the same goes for you SB. Now get out of that bathroom and open that sachet of catfood before I shit under your pillow and spray your freshly-laundered shirts.

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re: zerofool2005

    >> He was downloading music. So i would guess he was using a Gnutella based P2P client like Limewire.

    I can remember downloading what was supposed to be GTA San Andreas from Limewire - the first time I got Chicago, so I tried again and got a porno starring Snoop Dogg. It is very possible his cat could have pressed random buttons and downloaded a rar file containing 1000s of CP images. My daughter, when she was 18 months old managed to randomly press buttons and activate a 180 degree screen rotation.

  40. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Hmmmm

    I suspect somebody has been taking LOLCats a little too seriously...

  41. p1nk_k1tten

    WTF?

    What a load of b***s***... PMSL! A lame excuse if i've ever heard one, it's like 'the dog ate my homework.'!!

  42. Kotonoha
    Go

    I'd like to see

    someone that can prove his cat didn't do it.

  43. Graham Marsden
    Coat

    So...

    ... has Ceiling Cat decided that just watching you isn't enough fun any more...?

  44. Bad Beaver
    WTF?

    Bad kitty.

    Bad, bad kitty. Really bad.

  45. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    hmm

    That does sound a bit beyond reasonable doubt, the chances of a cat hiting random keys to get that crap are remote but to get over 1000 pics? he must be having a laugh, i bet his whole defence is going to be about proving its possible all be it remote that that could happen.

    and you know what, knowing todays legal system he'll probably get away with it on that 1 in a billion technicality.

  46. Number6
    Coat

    Monkeys, cats and Shakespeare

    If you have an infinite number of cats walking over your keyboard then they'll eventually manage the complete works of Shakespeare, just as with the monkeys.

    I tend to lock my keyboard when I leave the computer because the cats in this house do walk over the keyboard. However, as far as I know none of them have downloaded porn yet.

    I assume they're using their IM (Instant Miaow) client to communicate with their friends.

  47. Neur0mancer
    FAIL

    Lets be honest

    It could happen....hehe

  48. Michael 28
    Thumb Up

    If I had a cat...

    ...i know what his online shenannigans would result in!

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/05/28/dearest_tinkebell/

  49. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    @fluffy

    Downloading music is not illegal. It's not even unlawful.

    That said, if anybody believes the "my cat did it" excuse, I'll be amazed.

    @El Reg : please can you make the icons part of the comment preview, as it affects the formatting?

  50. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    pfft.

    It's a bit of a CATastrophy.

  51. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not impossible...

    Like David 146 said, there is child porn on the p2p networks, so it's not completely inconceivable. But the fact that he had 1000 images makes it pretty darn unlikely. The only way that could reasonably happen by accident is if they were all in one giant zip file.

    Still, it's an original defense at least.

  52. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    Check the time and date stamps on the downloads

    If what he says is true, all the files of <insert adjective expressing utter horror and revulsion> pr0n should have come in at the same time and date.

    If the files were downloaded over a period of weeks or months, per the time and date stamps, then he is obviously lying and should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

    Either way, it seems highly suspicious that he would blame his cat for "accidentally" downloading some of the most disgusting, and very illegal, pr0n on Earth.

    I mean, what, no perfectly legal Bulgarian airbag models by accident, hmmmm?

  53. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmmm ...

    ceiling cat iz secretly downloading pron

  54. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Mishtake shomewhere?

    Was it really child pornography or did someone make a mistake. Sounds like it may have been "kitty porn".

    ....and the irony is that he was busted by a pussy

  55. alan 39
    Happy

    and to think

    All my cat does is shredd the stairs carpet when shes not getting enough attention, I should be thankful :)

  56. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    the p2p gnutella/limewire/kazaa angle would make sense

    I remember those days.

    I once tried downloading an episode of Doctor Who. No sooner had I hit the search button, the screen just filled with links to p0rn.

    I thought "hell the hell can you get links to porn from Doctor Who?" unitl I started reading some the the filenames like "16yr old girl visits doctor who..."

    Oh gawd!

    Honestly, there wasn't much you COULD type in without the search results looking like a porn grenade had just exploded on your screen, and beacuse those p2p files aren't vetted like torrents are, it was all pretty nasty stuff.

    I suppose if his defense lawyer could prove that the right key combinations could select the entire list and add it to the downloads, he might stand a chance...

  57. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    lol

    p2p networks are horrid things, I sure wouldn't use them for finding porn (or anything else for that matter), never know what you're gonna get, one minute you think you're getting hot lesbians next minute you've got granny and a mad midget doing the wild thing with a prosphetic penis.

    Limewire is a bit like a box of chocolates, except there's no chocolates just pieces of turd you have to eat, and you always know the next thing you're gonne pull out is a dirty turd.

  58. John 30
    Paris Hilton

    Obvious....

    Mrs Slocombe joke here.

    Paris, also for obvious reasons....

  59. Mark Monaghan
    Paris Hilton

    @AC 10th August 2009 09:16

    >I thought "hell the hell can you get links to porn from Doctor Who?" unitl I started reading some the the filenames like "16yr old girl visits doctor who..."

    Do not enter the names of both WW2 atomic bombs into a search engine at the same time, unless you want some seriously disturbing results. I speak from personal experience.

    Trying to book a hotel in France might be interesting as well...

  60. Eden

    Good grief

    As stated it's "possable" just not probable.

    P2P is a minefiled though!

    You type in ANYTHING, you'll get pr0n in there, but even misclcicks aside, when I DL anything, I play/preview it as soon as there is enough data down as even something named what you want "EG Naruto episode 210" could be pr0n.

    I've had videos someone has obviously tried to "hide" by renaming them, not realising that they are still sharing them resulting in me bleaching my eyes instead of enjoying Anime.

    That said double checking the file properties will sometimes filter those out as well!

  61. Lottie
    Badgers

    Innocent until proven guilty

    It's just about possible -but not very probable- for this to have happened.

    It's feasable that kitty could have bounced on the computer at random and downloaded a big ol' .zip file of pix, especially if the dude was looking for a particular album and was weeding through all the dodgey files to find what he wanted. As has been stated earlier, on some P2P networks you end up getting pr0n links no matter what you type in and if they were still on the screen when kitty jumped on the keyboard, it could have started a D/L.

    It's not that probable, but until it's proved he's guilty, I'll not say owt else.

  62. Violet
    Boffin

    No paws for pawn

    http://www.bitboost.com/pawsense/

    Check out this gadget,supposed to detect cat steps on the keyboard and lock it .

    Not sure if it is a gag or not.

    Paris-becau...Sorry I am too tired to think of anything...

  63. Dale Richards
    FAIL

    @Number6

    If you have an infinite number of cats walking over an infinite number of keyboards, they will instantaneously produce an infinite number of copies of the entire works of Shakespeare. Additionally, an infinite number of the cats would not produce anything even remotely Shakespearean.

    Mathematically speaking, all cats write Shakespeare and all cats don't, therefore the number of cats in the Universe would be exactly zero. In fact, plus/minus infinity is equal to zero, and therefore everything that exists doesn't actually exist.

    Do you still want to try this experiment?

  64. Maryland, USA
    Thumb Down

    Reminds me of the U.S. school principal...

    ...who, after inserting his memory stick into a school PC, watched in horror as Google' Picasa swept the stick for images and thumbnailed naked babe after naked babe onto the auditorium screen as the entire school looked on. The principal explained that his son must have been using the memory stick.

  65. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    What I want to know

    I want to know why he didn't delete it, as soon as he realised what the cat had downloaded - and if he did notice that the cat had downloaded it how can he be certain that the cat is guilty. It could have been downloaded by malware, or planted there or any other equally (im)probable explanation.

    This case does raise interesting questions about the burden of proof. I know that anyone could make the excuse that their cat or a piece of malware downloaded - but doesn't that show that the burden of proof is currently too low? Either of these are possible, but he will still be convicted and so far as the world is concerned he may as well have abused the children himself. Okay, I realise that the law is possession of the image, not the intentional download or purchase of the images. But possession of computer files isn't like (say) possession of a firearm, the chances of cats or malware causing you to be in possession of a firearm is at least 1,000,000,000:1 - chances of malware downloading unwanted files could be as low as 1000:1.

    If they could prove that he had made some sort of payment/trade for the images or that he knew the abused or the abuser, that would be a lot more water tight. It might also prove that he had contributed to the harm done to the children or that he helped the abuser(s) benefit from the harm that they did.

  66. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    (untitled)

    I tried to get my cat to download some porn for me.

    It just stared at me and said, "Me ? How?"

  67. Andus McCoatover

    @Dale Richards

    Alluding to Schrödinger's cat, perhaps?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger%27s_cat

    Oh, and @number6 - in later news it seems Shakespeare's plays may not have all been written by him.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/5995083/Tomb-search-could-end-riddle-of-Shakespeares-true-identity.html

    St. Mary's Church was a church I lived near to, and visited literally dozens of times. "Double, double toil and trouble, fire burn, and cauldron bubble". - Shakespeare's "Scottish Play"*. (Actually, sounds like the missus making porridge in the morning.) Isn't that where we get the expression for Sunday working overtime "Double Bubble" from?

    *Yep, I'm superstitious about that play. You'll know it as MacB**th.

  68. HFoster
    Thumb Up

    @Andus McCoatover

    It's only considered bad luck to say MacBeth inside of a theatre, so you're safe on the internet. Unless you're on your laptop, sitting in a theatre.

    You're pretty fucked if that's the case.

  69. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    "downloaded" images?

    Do cached 'preview' images count against your daily limit of pr0n? There's a website I get Wallpaper images from that has an ad for a downloadable screensaver; whilst the Wallpaper images are completely worksafe (most of them, anyway :-O) the "stripping babes" screensaver is most definitely NOT.

    Although my Line Manager was more than happy to have some of the 'safe' pictures off me, he wasn't so keen on the "other" ones...

    Ever heard of an aircraft manufacturer called "Luton", after the town where they were based? They made a nice little aircraft that is just *perfect* for building as an introductory trainer for anyone wanting to learn to fly radio control airplanes. Just do an Internet search for 'Luton Minor' and you will find it... but try to make sure the Boss ain't around!

  70. Daniel 4
    Stop

    Sounds like a case for...

    ...real computer forensics. Personally, I can accept the possibility that 1000's of illegal images were downloaded due to the actions of an errant cat. Granted, it's unlikely in the extreme, but possible - especially if the cat actually downloaded a pr0n downloading virus. After all, I've never had my cat download anything, but I have had him wreck enough havoc walking on the keyboard once or twice that I considered nailing him to a wall.

    So, let this case hinge on another factor - was he aware of these images? Even if the cat did download the images, I sincerely doubt that it browsed them. Check the history and cache records of every program installed on the computer capable of viewing said image files. If not a one of them shows that the files were viewed, then I'll accept this under reasonable doubt. Otherwise, we must assume that someone with access to the machine was aware of the presence of the images. Presumably this is the owner, though I'd give him a chance to argue otherwise. He'd have to be very convincing, though.

    -d

  71. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    Bad form to blame the pussy

    The problem here is that I believe the guy didn't download it - he's too nuts. The more likely option is one of the "music files" he downloaded opened up his computer for use as a proxy for distribution. Or the "clean kazaa" client he downloaded and installed to get the music opened him up as a proxy site.

    This is becoming the "reason" for "constant tracking of packets" more and more around here. It sickens me in several ways... Ugh.

    Spam is not the only commodity on bot-nets, me lads...

  72. norman

    Proof of Ceiling Cat?

    Ceiling cat was doing more than watching.

    /Think of the Domo-kuns....

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