The Court in Florence established that the fact of publishing on a social network via the Internet the images of a sexual intercourse with a consenting minor of more than 14 years old does not fall within the scope of the criminal offense of ‘production’ or ‘utilization’ of child pornography material under Article 600 ter of penal code, if the accused did not intend to derive any utility from this conduct. On other hand, the accused had to be sentenced for the criminal offense of “diffusion of child pornography material” set out in paragraph 3 of Article 600 ter. The Court reached this conclusion following in-depth examination of the reasons for which mentioned crimes have been introduced in Italian legislation through law No. 269/1998, with subsequent modifications (law No. 38/2006); and this for the purposes of implementing domestically: a) the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography; b) the relevant EU legislation; and c) the Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse, which Italy ratified in accordance with law No. 172 of 2012.
Law No. 172 of 1 October 2012, Ratification and Implementation of the Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse, done at Lanzarote on 25 October 2007, and Norms on the Adaptation of the Domestic Legal System.