Today, in United States v. Laursen, --- F.3d ---, Case No. 14-30244 (9th Cir. 2017), the Court proves the old adage that bad facts make bad law.
The opening line of the opinion is: "In this appeal we address whether taking consensual nude
“selfies” involving a forty-five-year-old man and a sixteen year-old
girl is sufficient to support a conviction for
production and possession of child pornography."
Here is how the concurrence sums up the case:
Michael Laursen stands convicted of the “use” of a minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing visual depictions of that conduct and is currently serving the fifteen-year mandatory minimum sentence the statute requires. The photos in question were taken in the course of an ill-advised, but perfectly legal, relationship Laursen had with a young woman above the age of consent under Washington law. The record shows no evidence that Laursen distributed, transferred or otherwise displayed the images to anyone outside that relationship. In this respect, his situation is no different than the thousands of similar photos taken everyday by seventeen-year-old college students engaged in intimate, consensual relationships. The government admits the theory of prosecution here could be used to prosecute anyone snapping a photo showing consenting individuals engaged in intimacy.
In the course of affirming the conviction, the Court rejects all the defendant's arguments. If you have a production case, this opinion is a must read.
