U.S. Sentencing Guidelines § 2G2.2(b)(4) authorizes a four-level enhancement in child pornography cases when the images possessed or distributed portray sadistic conduct or depictions of violence, which means additional years on top of what is already a very significant term…
Category: Sex Crimes
2015
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Illegal Pornography | Sex Crimes
A little over a decade ago, the New York Times called the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals—which encompasses North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland—“the most aggressively conservative federal appeals courts in the nation.”
Time has its…
2015
Category: Illegal Pornography | Sex Crimes
Last year U.S. Attorney Loretta E. Lynch announced the federal government’s intention to investigate and prosecute cases of child pornography, regardless of the scale of individual involvement. This includes simple possession of child pornography by individuals.
Homeland Security Cracks…
2015
Category: Appeals | Federal Criminal Law | Sex Crimes
SORNA, the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, became law in 2006. We recently posted a piece about how the Fifth and Eleventh Circuit Courts of Appeals have expanded the definition of what constitutes a sex offense under the law.…
2015
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Illegal Pornography | Sex Crimes
On September 23, 2015, the Fifth Circuit in United States v. Schofield added a new offense in the definition to the Sex Offender and Registration Act (SORNA).
Enacted in 2006, SORNA is codified in Sections 16901 through 16962 of…
2015
Category: Drug Crime | Federal Criminal Law | Sex Crimes
The U.S. Congress has used mandatory minimum sentences since it first enacted federal penal crimes. The 1790 Crimes Act created 23 federal crimes, seven of which carried a mandatory death sentence. Three of those crimes—treason, murder and piracy—still carry the…
2015
Online dating is now a $2 billion industry. More than 49 million in the U.S. have tried online dating, each customer spending nearly $250 a year for the service.
But there are pitfalls and perils in what Berrien County,…
2015
Category: Illegal Pornography
Juries don’t always get it right, especially in extremely prejudicial cases involving allegations of sex crimes involving children. But, sometimes, just sometimes, an appeals court is forced, “after reviewing all the evidence in a light most favorable to the prosecution,”…
2015
Category: Sex Crimes | Uncategorized
The Sixth Amendment’s Confrontation Clause guarantees a criminal defendant the right to confront and cross-examine adverse witnesses against him. The amendment is made applicable to the States by virtue of the Fourteen Amendment.
However, there are some exceptions to…
2015
Category: Illegal Pornography | Uncategorized
Whether Yuri Bershchansky possessed child pornography in November 2010 in violation of Section 2252 (a) (4) (B) and (b) (2) of Title 28, United States Code, will never be truly known.
Why?
The Department of Homeland Security, in…