KENTUCKY — On this week’s program, we’re discussing April being Child Abuse Prevention month.
Child abuse rates here in the Commonwealth continue to surpass the national average.
The most report released by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services found that about a 12 kids out of every 1,000 in Kentucky, experience some form of abuse.
The same report also ranks Kentucky 14th in the country in terms of child abuse rates. Most victims were younger than a year old.
During this In Focus Kentucky segment, State Rep. Stephanie Dietz, R-Edgewood, discusses her legislation, House Bill 207, which was signed in law by Gov. Andy Beshear, D-Ky., in March 2024. The new state law now bans what’s known as child “sex dolls” and also makes computer-generated child sexual abuse material a felony in Kentucky.
“This was actually a bill that I filed in the last session and didn’t have any movement. I had been contacted by our Commonwealth Attorney in Kenton County, Rob Sanders, after a case in Kenton County had come down actually in January of 23 that involved child sex dolls and it had to do with probable cause. And in the court ruling, they reversed a conviction because they found that there wasn’t probable cause based on the child sex doll. So I ran that in 23, didn’t get any movement, filed it again in 2024. And before we started session, I was contacted by Attorney General-elect Coleman and he said this was going to be one of his top three priorities. So, with that and the encouragement of the Commonwealth attorneys again, I filed it for the 2024 session,” said Dietz.
Dietz also says HB 207 fixes a legal loophole, allowing law enforcement to use possession of a child sex doll as probable cause to search someone’s property for further evidence. It would make possession (as well as selling and transporting) of child sex dolls a felony sex crime.
The bill would also make it a felony to create or promote computer-generated child pornography by targeting artificial intelligence, or AI-generated abuse material.
You can watch the full ‘In Focus Kentucky’ segment in the player above.