The Fort Worth Police Department spent nearly $7,000 to send five officers to New York City to investigate child pornography allegations against photographer Sally Mann. The officers visited four major museums—the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and the Whitney Museum of American Art—to examine Mann's photographs in their collections and speak with curators. The trip, which cost $6,988.77, came after Mann's works were seized from a group exhibition at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth following complaints from locals and elected officials who deemed the images "grossly inappropriate." The investigation was later dropped and the photographs returned.
This incident matters because it highlights ongoing tensions between artistic expression and child protection laws, particularly regarding Sally Mann's iconic but controversial photographs of her own children. The police's costly and ultimately fruitless fact-finding mission—the works were not even on public view during their visit—drew national condemnation from civil liberties organizations. The case underscores how local law enforcement can overreach in targeting art institutions, raising questions about censorship, the policing of imagery, and the resources expended on investigations that challenge First Amendment protections in the visual arts.