Cambridge, Maryland Mayor Andrew Bradshaw, the youngest mayor the city ever elected, now faces 50 counts of distributing revenge porn. State prosecutors announced yesterday that Bradshaw used Reddit to distribute intimate photos of a woman with whom he had previously been romantically involved. Prosecutors allege that he used photos of the victim’s face and “intimate parts” on a Reddit created to facilitate degradation and humiliation, and subreddits devoted to sexual “raceplay.” Bradshaw posted racial slurs there.
Maryland’s Revenge Porn Statute, Maryland Criminal Law Article § 3-809, prohibits “the non-consensual distribution of a private visual representation of another which exposes their intimate body parts or displays them engaged in sexual activity, with the intent to harm, harass, intimidate, threaten or coerce the person depicted.”
The woman, called “Victim I” in the charging document (here), did not consent to the use of her photos. She contacted law enforcement in May about the unauthorized posts, and a police investigation led to yesterday’s charges. Bradshaw faces a maximum penalty of two years of incarceration and a $5,000 fine for each count if convicted.
Observations:
- This isn’t going to do much for the Maryland GOP’s efforts to make inroads against the Democratic monopoly in the state.
- How do people this stupid get elected? I just don’t understand it.
- When they do get elected, can’t they control themselves sufficiently not to do something like this?
- I suspect Bradshaw’s political career may be stalled for a while.
Ethics Alarms 
How do these people get elected? I can answer that!
I live outside of nearby Salisbury, MD. In cities like Salisbury and Cambridge, city politics just doesn’t attract a lot of attention. There’s usually not much of interest to the average voter on the table. With low voter turnout, it becomes something of a popularity contest: the people who “know” Alice (family contacts, business contacts, people at her church, people who participated in charities she supported) will get out the vote for Alice, the people who “know” Bob do the same. The politician with the biggest network of contacts who can remember their name will win, regardless of relevant attributes.
(For example, this fine fellow won in a runoff election, 1,643 votes to 1,219.)
Isn’t that guy an Omega Theta Pi?
And he did this to a black woman? On the Eastern Shore of Maryland? Must be mercury poisoning from eating too many soft shell crabs.
Or did he play on the Duke lacrosse team?
I read the charging documents, she was a white woman. The “raceplay” posts were implying she was sleeping with a black man (or “a [redacted]” according to the charges.)
That’s nice. Probably even worse?
I don’t know. How did someone like Anthony Weiner get elected? Why wasn’t Ted Kennedy sent packing after Chappaquiddick? How about John Edwards, who had an affair while his wife was dying of cancer? And then there are the last two presidents. The American political parties run who they run and then people cast their ballots mostly based on the letter next to the person’s name. Occasionally one who is very bad, like the borderline pedophile judge in Alabama, will get rejected, but that’s the exception rather than the rule. Then there was the congressman in Montana who body slammed a reporter. Actually, maybe I’ll forgive him, since I hate the media even more than I hate politicians, and I think occasionally reporters need to be put in their place. I still half-wish Michael Grimm had actually gone after that other reporter and in fact thrown him over the balcony. Of course if he did that, now he’d be cooling his heels in prison for a very long time.
1. Weiner was smart, talked a good game, and was the last person anyone would expect to try to be sexy.
2. As a resident of Massachusetts in that period, I understand the extent of Kennedy worship but don’t expect anyone else to.
3. Edwards set off my “phony alarm’ from the start, but as with JFK, most people are suckers for good hair.
4. Trump was running against Hillary.
5. Biden was running against Trump.
But Steve’s point remains a valid one. It’s hard to be shocked politicians are creeps.
And look at this guy. He looks good in that gorgeous mohair (?) coat. Matches his honey colored hair perfectly. He could be a Kennedy.
How do these people get elected?
My question is why is their a market for this crap. When you have a vehicle such as Reddit that provides a platform for such behavior it is prima facie evidence that such behavior is going mainstream. People like this can get elected because there are sufficient numbers of voters who engage in similar activities and find nothing wrong with behaving that way. That is a damn shame.
I would concur with Emily’s assessment above as I live in Hagerstown, MD and the same electoral conditions exist here. We had our MD Delegate MCKee (D) charged with and convicted of possessing child porn and another councilman – years ago – had a consensual, albeit illegal, sexual encounter with a minor. For many politicians the ability to hide their dark side is how they are able to get elected.
Nonetheless, attributing this type of activity to any specific political party is not helpful to political discourse. It is like saying Marion Barry’s cocaine bust harms Black Democrat candidates. Painting anyone else with that brush would be bigoted in my estimation
Am I the only person on the planet who has “not videotaped, photographed, or recorded in any manner or fashion” my intimate sexual encounters? Just asking so I can understand the parameters of “normalcy.”
I think it’s not at all common among Ethics Alarm demographics. But as I understand it, since most Of the dating experience these days takes place over text messaging (with the occasional dinners and meetings sprinkled among weeks of messages,) it is actually very common for those on the dating market to send increasingly intimate pictures or make record of face to face intimate encounters, since most of the time they spend “together” won’t be in person.
It’s almost certainly unwise, but similar to how it was normal-but-unwise to eventually “go all the way” before birth control; no one who’s recently fallen in love ever thinks their prince charming or fair princess might be a frog. Obviously this time it’s fine because you will be together forever.
Ew.
DanL
I know no one that engages in this. That is not to say that with those with whom I am aquainted don’t do these things it is just that I would not be in a position to know about it.
I wondered about the person who informed the victim about it. Why is that person hanging in Reddit sex tape space. As I understand it, these subreddits are topic specific so someone was looking for sexual content.