I went through something like this three years ago. A person in our circle of friends from high school was busted for child pornography. When the news broke, I was in disbelief. A friend of mine sent me a screenshot of his picture on the local news. IT was one of the most surreal feelings I had ever experienced.

As we got more details, it was almost like that person died. There were a total of 18 (yes, eighteen) charges against him. He had hundreds of gigabytes of the garbage in his mom's home (he was staying there since the dude couldn't hold a job). He was a scumbag, but no one, and I mean no one expected him to sink to this level of degeneracy. He only spent three months in jail (his girlfriend got him a lawyer ... he made a plea bargain and turned in all of the people in his ring). After he got out, he was telling 20 different stories to 10 different people. The lies were incomprehensible. He was basically dead to anyone that knew him (he still is if you ask me).

In my experience, people that know JT personally are experiencing feelings as if JT committed suicide. They're going to lash out and say things that people might find offensive. People are going to question themselves thinking they saw signs (you'll see some people say that "maybe this or that was a sign") ... the best thing you can do is give those people that knew him a pass for the time being (unless they were involved with feeding his sickness obviously) ... once things settle down, people closely involved with him will become a lot more sensible in their comments.

As for owners of JT's games ... this "pedophile designed" feeling will pass too ... you'll see that the machines are just "things". I can understand if people want to get rid of anything that deals with him .... been there, done that ... however, you'll start to see that they're just objects and don't have anything to do with JT's sickness. As someone else pointed out, Hitler was basically responsible for the VW Beetle (hell, VW in general) ... that doesn't make a person that like that product/company a Nazi.

There needs to be stricter, more devastating penalties for owning/distributing this trash ... I don't think your average person comprehends the lives this garbage wrecks. In the case of the person I knew, I wouldn't care if he had gotten the death penalty ... the amount of garbage he had translates into THOUSANDS of destroyed lives.

Did Lonny ever open his place out in Denver? JT could probably get a gig there as a greeter.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/new-arcade-museum-opening-in-denver-colorado

Feel free to believe what you want but you are wrong. Just sayin'.

People who are "cleared of all charges" aren't placed on sex offender registries.

Perhaps you know more about the situation than I do. Just going by what I read from a Google search.

Google search harder. The word "cleared" was used by the American press, not the british legal system. He was placed on a british Sex Offender registry for five years and received an official "caution." He admitted to using his credit card to access porn. He claimed it was "research."

You can believe him or not. But it's misleading when people say he was "cleared" of the charges. He absolutely wasn't. Would be more accurate to say he got away with it. I doubt if you or I would have been as lucky in the same circumstance.

Pete's own words from articles:

''I have looked at child porn sites maybe three or four times in all, the front pages and the previews,'' he told The Sun. ''But I have only entered once using a credit card, and I have never downloaded.''

Asked why he chose not to go to court to declare his innocence, he said he was simply ‘exhausted’ at the time and had been given just half an hour by officers at Kingston police station to decide whether to accept the caution.

He said he and his lawyers were ‘surprised’ by the police’s decision because they had all believed he would be let off.

He added that he thought prosecution lawyers would ‘****ing rip me apart’ if he went to court.

So he was never totally exonerated for his admissions, and was placed on a sex offenders list for five years which they called a "caution" in England.

**CrazyLevi beat me to it.**

Have any of you in the Chicago area seen this in the big newspapers or tv news stations yet? I'm sure once someone tips off the local media that this is a "high-profile" person, the story will get more attention. I can see the tv news tag now: "Shocking reports that a Chicago area man, famous for making a favorite pastime of children, arrested for pedophilia". Stern better have a fast thinking media team to react, but a small company like them likely will get hit with a ton of bad press over this.

Stern should absolutely release a short and simple statement. "JT is suspended pending resolution of his legal issues" would absolutely suffice.

I hope somebody over there has the good sense to do this today.

I would suggest Stern puts in their statement that they have no involvement or information related to the private lives of their employees. They need to put as much distance they can from this and to be fair to Stern it has nothing to do with them. I am sure they are shocked as everyone. They need to tell everyone employed by them to not comment and give Ritchie a smack upside the head, for being a dumbass.

It's all bad... but what would kill Stern would be if JT had those type files or searches on work computers... yikes... nothing good about any of this

Yeah I thought of this too and didn't want to say it out loud. If the police found anything on a Stern computer and fuck what a mess it would be.

Not true.

Pete is a Registered Sex Offender.

If he was just a regular sod, he would be in jail right now.

#KillYourIdols

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As i read some of these posts folks are mentioning they have underage children.

1) why mention you have underage children in a public forum?

2) i dont have children so that means my opinion on the subject matters less?

Guess I didn't wanna search that hard.
Gross, Pete! Shame on you, bro.

Question to those selling the game because of this, Do you feel the need to disclose this to potential buyers?

I did, but I think that is up to a buyer. As many have said the game is designed and created by numerous people, but to me it was worth mentioning.

Its such a tough thing, I would disclose it myself but I feel for people. You spend that kind of coin on a pin and could end up taking a big loss on it. Not everyone is in a position to be moral about this stuff. I would fault no one that kept one of his pins or enjoyed it. I just know for me it would bother me and I would move the pin and I'm lucky enough to be in a position to do that. I would not expect people to get fleeced on a pin over this and it sucks that I think people will.

1) Why not? People love talking about their interests and lives, and typically children are near the top of that list. It's up to them if they want to talk about their kids online, but there is nothing wrong with it.
2) Nope. I don't think having children has anything to do with the weight of anybody's opinion on this topic. Maybe it feels more personal or uncomfortable to parents with young children, but all can discuss!

I watched the first episode of a new Netflix series called Ozark last night. This reminds me of something in the show. It's out of context, but it goes something like this...

Drug dealer is telling a metaphorical story..."My father caught his housekeeper stealing $5 from him. She has worked for him for 15 years. What should he do?"

Jason Bateman finally gets the correct answer (after several others get it wrong and take a bullet to the head). The correct answer is, "Fire her. It's not the first time she stole from him, it's just the first time she got caught."

Of course your opinion or feelings don't matter less.

As a father, I can certainly say that having kids kicked a sense of "protection mode" into gear that I'd never felt before. Hard to explain beyond that, but perhaps folks are tapping into those feelings of protectionism by stating that they have kids.

Folks are acting like playing one of these pins will in some way make the player complicit with or exposed to the influence of this dude.

Not letting a kid play one of them? I'm pretty sure there's no subliminal brainwashing going on here.

I get the revulsion to the individual, but this sort of reaction to an existing pin? I don't get it.

I don't know why that would be a mess. They would take his PC and that would be the end of it.

It would only be a mess if someone at Stern had knowledge of his issue. Look at what occurred at Penn State.

The facts of the case aren't out, but if this somehow goes down the road of the worst of the worst case scenarios, and comes out that Stern had somehow ignored a tip or turned a blind eye to a comment by an employee... if they had quietly asked him to remove material from a work computer and swept if under the rug...then, yeah, it could turn into a big mess for Stern.

It's also worth noting that no single person, especially in the context of the major manufacturers, creates a pinball machine. The lead designer is one of a whole team of people that play a role in the development of a game. It would be unfair to pan any historical game simply because one of several dozen people on the development team may have done something bad.

Some Mother or Father finds out dirty pictures of their child have been spread through a PC and Stern and you bet your ass they are going to sue. It's a liability nightmare for Stern.

I agree with the post below me and I didn't want to post it earlier, there is enough on the table without adding any what ifs.

This is for sure putting the cart way before the horse but if by very remote chance there was child porn found on his PC at his work place, they actually can take every machine in that place of business.

However lets not even start that rumor or even go off on that tangent, for that's not even a thought right now. For if it was there, there would have already been a digital trail to the dark web from those machines for their IP's, so mostly likely not going to happen.

Man you guys are like way ahead of anything to do with this.

read my post again, I'm not even there and spelled out why.

He's going to be fired, not suspended, and they won't say a thing about it unless a news source drags them into it.

If JT had any decency, he would resign ASAP. I know he hasn't been proven guilty yet though.

If he's decent he needs his job & monies to fight a legal battle for against horrible charges against him.

If he's guilty he isn't decent...obviously.

This is bad news. I like his games. Has to be a major bummer for the team @ Stern.

I refuse to associate his personal life with the pins he was involved in. I still have and enjoy playing GB.

I don't really think that is the reasoning behind it. I think for many that collecting pinball machines is more than just playing them. Collectors also enjoy the history and stories regarding particular games as well as the people that had a part in making them. Some even arrange their line-ups so that games from a certain designer (or even artist) are grouped together.-You could have a Lawlor section where you group Earthshaker, Whirlwind, Funhouse, etc. But now with this latest revelation that history is tainted for any game JT was associated with, and the game may conjure up unpleasant thoughts when looking at the game.

On a totally unrelated note this made me think of a true story about a friend not too far from me that bought a house about 8 years back. It was just he and his wife at the time but now they have 3 young kids. When they bought the house it was disclosed that the former owner died via suicide which is why the house was available. He later came to find that the previous owner moonlighted as a professional clown. The owner hung himself in his now eldest daughter's bedroom. The house is in a desirable neighborhoods and was a bit of a fixer-upper. When my friend was renovating one of the bathrooms he discovered that the mirror was a 2 way mirror and the wall was previously patched up from the adjoining room which would allow someone outside the room to look in. If that were me living in the house I would be creeped out and would have moved after finding this out. Every time I've been over or even driven by I can't help but think about that creepy clown (who may or may not have been a pervert).-I don't know anything else about him. But my friend and his family love the house and have no intentions of moving. -and they aren't doing anything wrong by staying there.

I just learned that my Mustang was designed by the accused. Don't care.

Maybe they'll get around to checking any computers where he worked ?

LTG : )

Not quite. Easy to read up on it.

And different country, different rules, and lots of money.

If he was "cleared", he'd have finished his book on the subject.

LTG : )

While it's going to be each person's own views & reasoning for selling any games attributed to JT , To those that are selling their machines in light of this news I'd ask the following questions as I'm trying to understand the rationale.

If you feel sick for owning a game that JT has worked on, or sick at the prospect of a child playing said game - why would you entertain the idea of exchanging money for it?

If you feel that said machine hurts you or others around you, wouldn't the best course be to destroy the machine to ensure it doesn't get further exposure?

If you don't feel the machine is hurting anyone, then why would you sell it in the first place?

I'm not calling out anyone here, but when I see these machines suddenly going up for sale in various places (not heavily discounted in the slightest), I have to think that people are simply using this time to get out and maintain maximum profit - and if someone is concerned with maintaining maximum profit off a situation like this, while claiming this upsets them, makes them sick etc, well - it's very telling in my opinion.

No doubt all of this is very polarizing thus far - but I can't let one person who had involvement with design of a game be responsible for the sum of it's parts. How can you dismiss the contributions of Python for his art and concepts or Forden for his amazing soundtrack and design on Bride of Pinbot for example and hang everything squarely on JT?

Is there a list available of everyone of JT's games he designed? I found a list online, but definitely wasn't complete. The newer games weren't listed.

Decent was bad choice of word.

He could possibly have strong feelings of guilt that would make him resign. Some pedophiles do feel guilt and shame regarding their behavior.

These were some of my same questions when people started saying they will be distancing themselves from his machines. I understand people who want to do this, but my first thought was, we all know, no one will be fire selling them to get rid of them due to this. They might post them for sale, but are still going to try and get every penny out of them they can.

i definitely wouldn't do that. if god forbid they stumbled upon anything, they'd have 1 of 2 choices. wipe it clean, destroying evidence and obstructing justice, or being responsible to bring it to the authorities attention. they should stay as far away from this as possible, other than terminating his employment.

You're argument isn't well reasoned and not applicable. The pinball machine and its design were not part of the commission of a crime. You're hypothetical house is. You've applied different criteria to the objects in question.

Ethically, Stern should be doing this right now. In fact, I'm sure they've been busy doing just this.

The United States is guilty of having permitted slavery in the past. You choose to live in the United States knowing its past. So you must be ok with slavery.

These sorts of guilt by association arguments are tired and weak.

Legal knowledge.

One "count" equates to one charge each determined by an independent separate offense.
This does not necessarily constitute an indictment of charges, unless previous evidence is established prior to issue of a search warrant.
Many times charges are modified (often reduced or even eliminated) from the original arrest, as a district attorney or court starts as high as they can go, and works downwards on what evidence is available to actually prosecute a case.
In non jargon it is sometimes called "making it stick".
Remember the warrant was for a search, not initial seizure or arrest, based on indications of evidence.

None of the true formal details were reported (as correctly done) and significant additional legal discovery is still required.
This is not a period where "guessing" or speculation is advised.
It will be weeks before a detailed accurate assessment is completed for arraignment, if applicable.

This aspect is not the true complication of the current problem, and goes way beyond what should be discussed on pinball forums.

This situation is an example of why legal education is so important in understanding how cases are handled, prosecuted, and outcome determined. It is too easy to presume aspects which ultimately lead to poor assessments by the general public.

I speak from experience based on occupational requirements of intervention handling matters while serving in my first career in the United States Armed Forces.
Life is not always pleasant.

Guys do we really need a big debate about how people feel about owning his pins. No one needs to defend himself either way. If it doesn't bother you then by all means enjoy your pin. It is equally ok to say I'm not comfortable with this and choose to not own his pins.

Thankfully Blackknight is here to let you know that you're uneducated on the matter... and that you need to educate yourself.

Silly general public.

I don't think it's guilt by association but rather that some people don't want to keep physical objects around that remind them of something unpleasant. It could be something as simple as getting dumped by a girlfriend and choosing to rid your house of any of her possessions because you don't want to be reminded of her. I haven't watched any of the Naked Gun movies in a long time because they probably aren't as funny or enjoyable as they were before the OJ trial....

He isn't high-profile outside of the extraordinarily tiny pinball community. And it isn't a favorite pastime of children. Pinball started in bars, and today is primarily in barcades and the basements of middle-aged men. Children were banned from playing it in many areas. Unfortunately, one more old man charged with child pornography isn't uncommon. Unless this winds up being the tip of a much larger iceberg, it's already old non-news in a media market as large as Chicago.