ABOVE: detail from A Righteous Man’s Reward (2004) by serial killer Alfred Gaynor. Families of Gaynor’s victims denounced an auction featuring Gaynor’s art.

After the start of an online auction on Tuesday by prisoners’ aid program The Fortune Society, families of the victims of a Massachusetts serial killer persuaded state representative Peter Koutoujian to introduce a bill this week to prevent criminals from profiting from memorabilia related to their crimes. Alfred Gaynor, who raped and killed four women in 1997-98, has, like so many of his serial-killer brethren before him, undergone a religious conversion in prison, and contributed a ghastly, mawkish portrait of Christ kneeling in the desert. Labeling it “murderabilia,” the families and Koutoujian have said that Gaynor should not receive the proceeds from the auction.

People have cast this as a free-speech issue, although even Koutoujian has specifically stated that his bill is to prevent Gaynor getting the money, not to prevent him from displaying, giving away, or otherwise publicizing his artless scribblings. The drawing has already been sold to someone with the online moniker “Potsie,” for a grand total of $250. It’s tempting to just let this one slide, since the sum of money is so low and there is nothing about the drawing that exploits Gaynor’s victims. The question is whether the guy should get paid for art that no one would buy if he wasn’t famous for being a serial killer; It seems intuitively wrong for him to get the money, but on the other hand, we can’t think of a rational, moral reason why he shouldn’t. Anyway, everyone’s up in arms.

LINK: ABC News > U.S. serial killer art raises free speech debate