This guy may be safe in the State of Washington, if this case stands up (from Courthouse News):
Evidence does not support the luring conviction of a man who asked a 9-year-old boy, “Do you want some candy? I’ve got some at my house,” a Washington appeals court ruled. According to the trial record, 9-year-old C.C.N. was walking to a store to buy milk for his mother when Russell Homan rode a child’s Superman BMX bicycle past him and asked, “Do you want some candy? I’ve got some at my house.”
Homan then rode away without stopping.
When C.C.N. returned home and told his mother, she called the police. They located Homan, who admitted to riding his bike near the store. He was charged with one count of luring, convicted in a bench trial and sentenced to 120 days.
On appeal, Homan challenged the evidence presented by the state as well as the constitutionality of the luring statute, which prohibits a person from luring a minor or a person with a developmental disability into any area or structure that is obscured from or inaccessible to the public or into a motor vehicle.
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Homan’s offer of candy was “ill-advised,” but that does not qualify as luring under the statute, according to the ruling.
“We disagree with the state that Homan’s statements demonstrate both an invitation and an enticement to lure C.C.N. into a nonpublic structure,” Bridgewater wrote. “Rather, they show an offer of candy and a statement regarding its location. Furthermore, there is no conduct that elevates these statements to either an invitation or an enticement. Homan was riding by C.C.N. as he made the statements, and he did not slow or stop as he made them or even look back afterward. While Homan’s statements were ill-advised, they did not constitute a felony, and we remand to the trial court to reverse his conviction with prejudice.”
I’m assuming this will be appealed up to the Washington Supreme Court, but so far it appears that a stranger offering a child candy in one’s house is not enticing a child in Washington. Good job guys!
Who’s Candy and what crime is she accused of committing?
Self-explanatory. Merry Christmas.
Floyd, this post is another example of the “officer do something” circumstance. Officer did something only to have the courts negate the arrest. This is how it works and the system is as it should be. The police do their job as defined by the peepul. If the peepul don’t like the laws that are enforced, the peepul should change them. If the peepul don’t like the asinine judges’ decisions, well … good luck with that one!!
This case is ruh-dick-uh-luss. Bicycle man threw out a little piece of bait but didn’t get a nibble so he pedaled on. Next time, he might get luckier, find a kid who’ll respond to him, who’ll bite. It’s incremental. Then after a child is molested or murdered, the peepul will want to know why, and all the experts and newsies will delve into the pedal-phile’s past and ask the question, “Why didn’t the police, the judges, the principals, the psychologists, the psychiatrists, the candy makers do something?”
In this case you have a perfectly good law — perfectly understandable to everyone except two edumacated judges. The people did decide that luring a child away from parental custody was illegal and the judges subverted that in their desire to practice legal gymnastics. I’m hopeful the Supreme Court will reverse and that these judges would be dislodged at the next judicial election. Of that last part, I’m not hopeful in the least.
Yep. I’m witcha! [And I like your van. Hope it has orange shag carpet back there.]
Makes one wonder how many of these there are out there!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1QmzHxiEYQ
Is that Jerry Sandusky’s ride?
Not unless it has a shower in addition to the orange shag carpet.
Ewww
Bill Clinton had Astroturf in the back of his ride…
And most of his rides were on their backs on astroturf.
Knees.
But, I want Candy!
So you like Mohawks do you?