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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Mar 2005
    Location
    Michigan
    Posts
    28,906

    Default Re: Blackmail and Extortion

    Georgia Law provides:
    Quote Quoting Criminal Code of Georgia, Section 16-8-16.
    (a) A person commits the offense of theft by extortion when he unlawfully obtains property of or from another person by threatening to:
    (1) Inflict bodily injury on anyone or commit any other criminal offense;

    (2) Accuse anyone of a criminal offense;

    (3) Disseminate any information tending to subject any person to hatred, contempt, or ridicule or to impair his credit or business repute;

    (4) Take or withhold action as a public official or cause an official to take or withhold action;

    (5) Bring about or continue a strike, boycott, or other collective unofficial action if the property is not demanded or received for the benefit of the group in whose interest the actor purports to act; or

    (6) Testify or provide information or withhold testimony or information with respect to anotherīs legal claim or defense.
    (b) In a prosecution under this Code section, the crime shall be considered as having been committed in the county in which the threat was made or received or in the county in which the property was unlawfully obtained.

    (c) It is an affirmative defense to prosecution based on paragraph (2), (3), (4), or (6) of subsection (a) of this Code section that the property obtained by threat of accusation, exposure, legal action, or other invocation of official action was honestly claimed as restitution or indemnification for harm done in the circumstance to which such accusation, exposure, legal action, or other official action relates or as compensation for property or lawful services.

    (d) A person convicted of the offense of theft by extortion shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than one nor more than ten years.
    Adding a note in relation to the information below: The crime you see charged in cases of kidnapping is kidnapping. Extortion continues to be charged in Georgia.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jun 2006
    Location
    Arkansas
    Posts
    643

    Default Re: Blackmail and Extortion

    Blackmail and extortion are somewhat slippery crimes you don't see charged much anymore unless you have a Mel Gibson "Ransom" type situation or something akin to it where someone has kidnapped someone else and demands money for their safe return. But it looks like Georgia's statute is pretty broad and a prosecutor who had no fear might charge it. There's criminal libel too, also seldom seen today, but it may not exist in Georgia.

    Regardless of the criminal connotations, she is perhaps looking at the prospect of being sued for the tort of civil libel and it will be the pastor, not the State, who will decide whether to file that suit. A letter containing false information delivered to and read by another constitutes publication, a necesssary element of a libel claim.

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