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There is a very interesting controversy brewing in Orange County, Florida. A 13-year-old girl Alisha Dean has a MySpace page that portrays herself as a 19-year-old divorced woman. She has been accused about lying to two men — Morris Williams, 22, and Darwin Mills, 24, about her age in two separate incidents. Both have been convicted and sent to jail for statutory rape — regardless of whether the older looking girl deceived them. While her parents admit that they did not take down the MySpace page and that she still stays out late at night, her father insists that minors are not expected to have the same judgment as adults.

In the case of Williams, he testified that she told him that she was 18 and when he later found out the truth he went to her father. He later found out that she had previously resulted in another man being incarcerated. Remarkably, while she still had the MySpace page running the false information, the court still asked that the media not show her picture. The media largely refuses and ran pictures that show a much older appearing individual, as discussed at the link below. Ironically, by not showing her picture, it makes it more likely that a third or more individuals could be charged. Since both Dean and her parents had no apparent objection to posting her image and false story over the Internet, it seems rather strange to encourage the media not to run the pictures — particularly given the direct relation to the defense of these men.

Her father does not seem to view these problems as the result of his daughter or her parental controls. Jerry Dean supported the prosecutions and said “one of the reasons for the law is the fact that minors have poor judgment.” This of course begs the question of the judgment of Jerry as the father. Williams received six years probation with the first year in jail. The other five years he will have to wear an ankle monitor and I suppose he might have to register as a sex offender.

The application of these laws as strict liability offenses robs the system of any sense of balance. If there is a pattern of misrepresentation, it would seem an element that should go not only to the sentence but the merits of the case.

For the full story, click here.

UK: 12-Year-Old Girl Pretends to be 19 on Dating App, Goes to Man’s House and Fools Around, Man Goes to Jail

An office worker who lost his job and home after he spent the night with a 12-year-old schoolgirl who pretended to be 19 has been jailed for two-and-a-half years.
Carl Hodgson, 27, brought the girl to his Manchester quayside apartment after he met her on a dating app – not realising she used a fake profile which claimed she was ‘experienced’.
He admitted to carrying out a sex act on the girl and took an explicit image of her in a body stocking, writing: ‘Mine was decent, nailed that bird, unreal bod.’
He was arrested a month later after the girl’s mother found her daughter had logged onto his home WiFi and told police.

He said he did not know the girl’s real age and that it was her who suggested they go back to his apartment.
The girl, who is known to regularly go missing from home, admitted posing as a 19-year-old and said Hogdson did not know her real age.

Hodgson admitted engaging in sexual activity with a child, making and distributing indecent images and was ordered to sign the Sex Offenders Register for life.
He was banned from contacting girls under 16 without permission of their parents for seven years, and disqualified from living and sleeping in same household as child under 16. His not guilty plea for rape was accepted.
Judge David Stockdale QC told Hodgson at Manchester Crown Court: ‘You have expressed regret and remorse of your actions and I consider your remorse and regret to be genuine.

‘Whilst she was 12 at the time of these events, you did not believe that to be the case.
‘You took the complainant to your flat and you in due course spent the night with her and caused her to pose indecently for your own gratification. You were to boast later that you had sexual activity though it is fact you had not.
‘The complainant was by reason of her age highly vulnerable to exploitation and she was no doubt impressed by you.
‘This is most serious offending as you will now have appreciated. The effects on a child of such a young age of offending of this sort are well known and well documented, and these effects will last for the rest of the child victims life.

‘It’s inevitable, she will suffer in the long term as a result of your offending.’

Prosecutor Justin Hayhoe said: ‘He says he met the her through a dating application and her personal profile was over the age of consent. It stated she was experienced and he regarded their meeting as a date.

‘She presented herself on her social media profile as someone over the age of 16. She did say a meeting took place at the defendants flat and she maintained to the police that the defendant thought her age was 19 rather than 12.’

In mitigation, defence lawyer Alexander Leach said: ‘The defendant used a dating app, one which was used for adults designed for contact with other adults. It’s an extremely popular application widely used by various cross section of society.

‘He must have known she was significant younger than him, but he believed her to be older than 16. If he had been aware, he would not have deemed it appropriate to take her to the apartment and provide her with alcoholic drinks.
‘He has lost his employment, his home and he has the stigma which comes with offending of this sort.
‘There is no evidence this defendant sought out children for sexual gratification. It wasn’t his intention to commit the offence – it’s been a frightening experience for him.’

12-Year-Old Florida Girl Steals Dad’s Car to Meet Man for Sex

A 12-year-old Florida girl stole her father’s car and picked up her 14-year-old friend to meet an online predator in Louisiana, officials said this weekend.
Baby-faced Jade Gregory, of Union County, was reported missing last week after she hopped behind the wheel of her parent’s Ford Taurus, went to meet her pal Khloe Larson, then drove out of state.
The two kids had apparently been corresponding with an unknown person online and planned to meet him in Louisiana, according to reports.
Their sudden disappearance triggered a Missing Child Alert, and their youthful images were flashed across billboards and television screens across several Southern states.

Gregory drove her father’s truck all the way from the Gainesville area to Mobile, Alabama — a roughly five-hour trek.
Authorities said they were not accompanied by an adult during their journey and they had voluntarily left their homes.
The girls were later shocked to see their images on a television in an Alabama convenience store — and eventually decided to turn themselves in to local police.

A judge has criticised a 12-year-old girl who lied about her age to have sex with a man she met on the internet.

The judge said that he “reluctantly” had no option other than to jail 26-year-old Simon Foster for rape as the girl was too young to have legally consented. Foster will also have his name on the sex offenders register and be banned from working with children for life.

Judge Jeffrey Rucker told Exeter Crown Court that Foster had made his intentions clear on the website on which he met the girl. He said: “His intention was utterly clear, to find a sexual partner. The complainant knew that and could not pretend otherwise.”

When they met, on a sea-front in South Devon, the girl was 12. Judge Rucker said: “She said she was 15 and also said she was 17. The defendant says he believed what he was told.”

On the second occasion they kissed and had “intimate contact”. On the third Foster tried but failed to have intercourse and the girl performed oral sex on him. Because of her age, oral sex is classed as rape. When Foster was arrested he said there had been no rape and he denied “grooming” the girl. He said he believed that she was 16 and that everything had been consensual.

Foster, from Newton Abbot, Devon, admitted two charges of rape, one of assault on a child under 13 by penetration and one of sexual assault on a child under 13.

Sentencing Foster to two years in prison, the judge said that he was unable to impose a community sentence under the current law. He added: “Personally, on the basis of long experience, I would have thought that was the better option.”

Kyle Cross, 29, a former police officer, met a young woman, 19, online. They chatted for two weeks—she told him she was in college studying criminal justice—and then enjoyed a fantastic weekend of shopping, dining, and, eventually, sex.

Now Cross is facing two charges of third degree sexual abuse in his town of Dubuque, Iowa, because the girl was actually a runaway 14-year-old. As KCRG explains:

Cross told some friends about his weekend with who he thought was his new girlfriend.

"My friend was like, 'Is this the name that you said, who she is?' And I am like 'Yeah' and he was like, 'Well she's a missing juvenile.' And my heart just sank," Cross said.

After that exchange, Cross said he immediately told police where they could find her. She was staying at his house. …

Three weeks later, in mid-March, investigators arrested Cross at his home. He was charged with 3rd-degree sexual abuse, posted $10,000 bond, and was released.

"How am I supposed to know? I took her out in public. We did all of this. I mean it was real in my eyes, but it's a game to her. How am I supposed to know? " Cross asked.

Cross has already lost his job as a money guard because he's not allowed to carry a gun while he awaits trial. And it's difficult to find a new job, since he is presumed to be a sexual predator.

The heart of the matter is this: there is little recourse for people who sincerely and understandably, but wrongly, believe their partner is past the age of consent:

According to Iowa law, someone having sexual contact with a 14 or 15-year-old is only legal if the other person is older by four years or less. In all other instances, such contact is illegal. One Dubuque criminal lawyer doesn't think Cross' argument will hold up in court.

"It doesn't matter whether you know the other person's age or not. The minor could come forward with a fake ID, a forged birth certificate and a bunch of people attesting to their age. It makes absolutely no difference whether you intended to do something that was against the law or not," Dubuque County Public Defender Steve Drahozal said.

When I wrote here and elsewhere about Zach Anderson and Darian Yoder—teenagers who also slept with underage girls who told them they were 19—some commenters jeered, "They should have asked for proof of the girl's age before they did anything!" But apparently, even that is not enough: Falsified proof is no excuse. Maybe judges would like would-be paramours to submit to some kind of carbon-dating scheme, whereby a few cells from the object of their affection can be shipped to a lab to determine their exact age before the relationship proceeds.

Girl admits he did nothing wrong, has asked prosecutor to drop the case.

Computer science student Zach Anderson, 19, met a girl, 17, on the "Hot or Not?" app. He was from Elkhart, Indiana. She was 20 minutes over the border in Niles, Michigan. They hooked up. Once.

But it turned out the girl was really 14. She'd lied to Anderson and also in her profile. Now Zach sits in a Michigan jail, serving 90 days. When he gets out he will be on the Sex Offender Registry for 25 years.

Does anyone thinking treating him this way is necessary to keep kids safe? Anderson and his family certainly don't.

Neither does his supposed underage victim. The girl readily admitted that she lied about her age, and in this WSBT-TV interview her mother admitted that Anderson "didn't do anything my daughter didn't do." Everyone agrees the encounter was completely consensual. The only reason the police became involved at all is because the girl suffers from epilepsy, and when she didn't come home as quickly as expected her mom worried and called the cops for help.

In this excellent South Bend Tribune article, the mom told a reporter that she didn't just ask the judge for leniency, "we asked him to drop the case."

But court records show that Berrien County District Court Judge Dennis Wiley (who once jailed a woman for 10 days over Christmas because she cursed while paying a traffic ticket in the county clerk's office) paid none of the participants any mind. At sentencing he told Anderson, "You went online, to use a fisherman's expression, trolling for women to meet and have sex with. That seems to be part of our culture now: meet, hook up, have sex, sayonara. Totally inappropriate behavior. There is no excuse for this whatsoever."

Now, in addition to registering as a sex offender, Anderson will spend five years on probation, during which time he will not be allowed to live in a home where there is internet access or a smart phone. He will obviously have to change his major. And he is forbidden to talk to anyone under age 17, except his brothers.

I spoke to Anderson's dad, Les Anderson, yesterday. He said the family is about to try to withdraw the original plea deal Zach agreed to, because, he says, "The prosecutor violated the plea."

You see, in Michigan there is a leniency provision for first-time offenders under age 21. It keeps them off the registry. As part of the plea deal, the prosecutor had agreed not to take a position pro or con on whether to apply the provision to Zach. But when it came time for sentencing, the prosecutor reminded the judge that he had denied leniency in similar cases twice before.

That struck defense lawyer Scott Grabel as not exactly neutral. "He did us a favor," says Grabel, "because now we have a basis to withdraw the plea."

I chatted with Grabel yesterday, too. He says that if the case is tried anew, he would like to hold off for another six-to-nine months, because by then it's possible that the Michigan Supreme Court will have decided to allow defendants to use she lied about her age as a component of their defense.

Right now, 20 states allow this. But in the other 30, you can turn to your would-be hook-up and say, "'Look I want to see a passport or driver's license,' and I'd say that's pretty diligent of you," says Grabel. But if the I.D. is fake and she is actually underage, you can still be convicted of statutory rape.

Let's hope Michigan makes that change. In the meantime, Judge Wiley should realize that just because you met someone online does not mean you are a depraved fiend who deserves 25 years on the Sex Offender Registry.

At last America is realizing how Taliban-esque our sex offender laws can be. First came the story of Elkhart, Indiana's Zach Anderson, which hit the front page of the The New York Times on Sunday (you read it here first). Zach, 19, had sex with a girl who told him she was 17 but turned out to be 14, and a judge decided that makes Zach a sex offender for life. Learning about his case, another family in Elkhart couldn't believe it.

Their son was living out the exact same story.

As Fox28 reports, Darian Yoder, also a 19-year-old, met a girl on the same app Zach used, "Hot or Not." The girl said she was 17 but turned out to be 13—a fact Darian learned months after the encounter, when he was arrested for sexual misconduct.

Judge Dennis Wiley, the same judge who sneeringly told Zach, "That seems to be part of our culture now: meet, hook up, have sex, sayonara. Totally inappropriate behavior," presided over Darian's trial and sentenced him to the same draconian fate. Darian, like Zach, is now officially a sex offender, for life. As such, he cannot be around anyone under the age 18, as if he were some insatiable child molester. That includes his younger brother and sister, whom he has not seen since he was sentenced. His devastated family has been torn apart.

According to Fox28:

"I know I'm not a sex offender," said Yoder. "Had I known her age, I never would have even talked to her."

The young man can't go to church, a park, or even a mall.

"It's just far too much," said Yoder. "I have no life. I can't do anything."

"It's not a family anymore," said Yoder's mother Vanissa Messick. "And it just doesn't feel like it ever will be."

Darian says he can't be near anyone under age 18, including his younger brother and sister, whom he hasn't seen since his arrest.

"I mean we can't have Christmas," said Messick. "He cant see them on his birthday, he can't… anything"

Darian was a teen who had sex with another teen—one he thought was his own age. If there's a predator in this story, it's the judge who keeps ruining the lives of these young men.

That is the power we give judges and prosecutors with our all-encompassing definition of what constitutes a sex offender. There are hundreds of thousands of people on the sex offender registry who bear no resemblance to the monsters we fear. Of the 800,000 registered sex offenders, roughly a quarter of them were added as minors, because young people have sex with other young people.

The sex offender list is a dungeon we can throw people in on the slightest pretext. Politicians and grandstanders exhort us to fear those on it. But it's a lot scarier to think about how easy it is for our sons to end up on that list themselves.