JAKARTA, Indonesia—U.S. citizen Taylor Kirby Whitemore was arrested on March 25 by local law enforcement for violating Indonesia’s laws about producing and selling adult content while in the country.
The Associated Press notes that Whitemore was arrested at Ngurah Rai International Airport in the country’s tourism-dominated province of Bali. He was headed for Malaysia, the wire service reports.
Yuldi Yusman, acting director general of immigration for the Indonesian Ministry of Immigration and Corrections, explained in a news conference Wednesday that Whitemore violated his tourist visa by violating the country’s strict pornography laws.
Whitemore was linked to accounts on both X and Telegram that promoted the exchange of money for paid pornographic content. Whitemore is still detained, and as of May 16, was held in a detention facility based in the national capital of Jakarta.
“We strongly suspected that the promoted videos he produced were taken in Indonesia,” said Yusman. Whitemore faces up to five years in prison and a fine of about $30,000 if he is found guilty. The state-owned news service Antara indicates that Whitemore first entered the country on January 25.
Though possessing a civil legal system, Indonesia is the largest Muslim-majority country in Asia and the world’s most populous. Thirteen percent of the world’s Muslims live in Indonesia. This means that much of the legal system in Indonesia is based on civil, traditional and Islamic Sharia law.
