Neb. Man Challenges Child-Enticement Conviction
I didn’t include this in yesterday’s round-up because I felt it was deserving of its own rant.
It makes me sick that this guy’s slimeball lawyer is hiding behind free speech and the “no child was actually hurt” to protect his client from going to jail. The predator was nabbed in an undercover online sting.
I wonder if the lawyer has kids. Because he is proposing to let his client go unscathed and back on the Internet until he can be caught harming an actual child.
Nice.
Another reason why you need PC Pandora computer monitoring software at home. Because even when the law nabbs the few predators they are able to catch, scumbag lawyers will argue to let them loose again…
May 25, 2009
Neb. man challenges child-enticement conviction
By MARGERY A. GIBBS, APOMAHA, Neb. – The Nebraska Supreme Court is being asked to decide whether a 2004 law aimed at sexual predators who use the Internet to lure children is constitutional.
The high court will hear arguments Friday in a case involving Todd Rung of Lincoln, who was sentenced last year in Lancaster County District Court to one-to-two years in prison for using a computer to try to entice a child to have sex with him.
Authorities said Rung, then 37, contacted an undercover officer online who was posing as a 15-year-old girl named “Missy.”
Police say Rung sent sexually explicit messages and pictures to “Missy,” then asked to meet her in a Lincoln park for sex.
When Rung arrived at the park, he was met by police instead. Police confiscated two condoms from Rung when he was arrested.
Rung’s lawyer, Deputy County Public Defender Shawn Elliott, argues that Nebraska’s child-enticement law violates the equal-protection clauses of state and federal constitutions.
“(I)t purports to impose the same punishment for a person who entices a virtual child to engage in sexual contact as the statutes impose for a person who actually engages in sexual contact with a child,” Elliott wrote in court briefs.
Elliott also argues that the law is vague and overly broad, violating Rung’s constitutional rights to free speech, free association and the right to engage in sexual behavior free from governmental intrusion.
“The statute targets speech, and not conduct,” Elliott wrote. “The statute does not require that person to take any action to commit the act other than the use of speech via a computer.”
Elliott also says the lower court imposed an excessive sentence, noting that “no child suffered as a result of (Rung’s) actions.”
Erin Leuenberger with the Nebraska Attorney General’s Office rejects Rung’s equal-protection claim in her brief, arguing that Rung was not treated differently from others convicted of similar crimes.
Leuenberger also discounts Rung’s claim that the state enticement law infringes on his free-speech rights, noting “the First Amendment does not protect enticements of children to engage in illegal sexual activity.”
The state’s brief says the lower court did not abuse its discretion in imposing a prison sentence instead of probation, noting that the court did not impose the maximum sentence allowed by law.
