Donovan wants ban on child sex dolls

Lawmaker calls playthings ‘outlets for pedophiles’

December 18, 2017 By Paula Katinas Brooklyn Daily Eagle

The life-like sex dolls that are made to resemble young children are a danger because they can encourage pedophilia, U.S. Rep. Dan Donovan says. Photo courtesy of Donovan’s office

Share this:

The sexual harassment accusations leveled against movie mogul Harvey Weinstein and a slew of prominent men in the worlds of politics and media are causing lawmakers to re-examine many other sex-related acts in the country.

And now, a Brooklyn elected official is going after creeps who get a kinky kick out of using sex toys that resemble young children.

U.S. Rep. Dan Donovan (R-C-Southwest Brooklyn-Staten Island) is pushing legislation to ban child sex dolls.

Donovan, who said his bill has 12 cosponsors, is calling the legislation the Curbing Realistic Exploitative Electronic Pedophilic Robots (CREEPER) Act.

The idea is to combat pedophiles who buy and sell the life-like silicone dolls, according to Donovan, who said the toys are manufactured to look like children as young as 3 years old. The sex dolls are anatomically correct versions of young children and come with “accessories” like false eyelashes, wigs, warming devices and cleaning tools. The dolls are imported from places like China, Hong Kong and Japan.

Perverts purchase the sex dolls via online websites, said Donovan, the former Staten Island district attorney. The sellers get around U.S. anti-porn laws by labeling the life-like dolls as mannequins or models to avoid detection, he said.

Possession of a child sex doll can sometimes be an indication that the person has a sick history of committing sex offenses against children, according to Donovan, who cited law enforcement sources.

“It’s a uniquely vile person who preys on children to fulfill horrific pedophilic urges. During my 20 years as a prosecutor, I put away animals who played out their disgusting fantasies on innocent children. What I saw and heard was enough to make anybody sick. Now, as a legislator in Congress, I’m introducing a bill to ban the newest outlet for pedophiles: child sex dolls,” Donovan said in a statement.

Child safety advocacy groups have endorsed the CREEPER Act. The supporters include Safe Horizon, Stop Abuse Campaign, Stop Child Predators, Foundation for Responsible Robotics and Campaign Against Sex Robots.

In addition, a petition on www.change.org supporting the legislation has garnered more than 49,000 signatures, according to Donovan’s office.

“Child sexual abuse is a heinous crime, one that no child should ever have to suffer. How, then, to reconcile civil society’s abhorrence of child abuse with the production and import of life-sized, life-like dolls of children to be used for sexual purposes? This is deeply concerning on many levels,” said Michael Polenberg, vice president of government affairs of Safe Horizon.

Stacie Rumenap, president of Stop Child Predator, said “sex offenders and pedophiles will stop at nothing to reach children” and that there “is no doubt these dolls will be used to lure and groom children, and will ultimately lead to more sexual abuse and exploitation of real children.”

Melanie Blow, COO of the Stop Abuse Campaign, called child sexual abuse “an epidemic in our society.”

Noel Sharkey, co-director of the Foundation for Responsible Robotics, said recent developments are alarming.

“There is currently a dramatic rise in the development of talking sex robots powered by Artificial Intelligence. The possibility of making anatomically detailed moving robot replicas of specific children for sexual gratification is now here and is surely a step too far. Such devices will, at the very least, have a pernicious impact on our society and create a threat to the sexual safety of our children,” Sharkey said.