[00:00:15] Speaker 05:
Good morning, Your Honor.

[00:00:16] Speaker 05:
May it please the Court.

[00:00:17] Speaker 05:
My name is Stephen Preziosi.

[00:00:18] Speaker 05:
I represent Jason Taylor.

[00:00:20] Speaker 05:
Your Honor, may I reserve two minutes for rebuttal?

[00:00:23] Speaker 02:
Hopefully.

[00:00:25] Speaker 05:
Yes, I go for it.

[00:00:26] Speaker 05:
Your Honor, Congress stated that the purposes of passing Section 1591 into law are as follows.

[00:00:35] Speaker 05:
The purposes of the statute are to combat trafficking,

[00:01:50] Speaker 01:
only have a de minimis effect on interstate commerce.

[00:02:42] Speaker 00:
or the internet connection.

[00:03:10] Speaker 00:
You think Walls is not controlling because it pertains to a different statute?

[00:03:13] Speaker 05:
Is that what you're saying?

[00:03:36] Speaker 05:
But we have Congress's findings of fact and if you look at the findings of fact

[00:04:08] Speaker 05:
Those facts are very distinct.

[00:04:11] Speaker 05:
There is no contemporary manifestation of slavery in this case.

[00:04:15] Speaker 05:
It is factually distinct.

[00:04:17] Speaker 05:
Congress did not intend to intrude into this area of state law that is traditionally prosecuted by the state.

[00:04:26] Speaker 05:
Your Honor mentioned the interstate commerce.

[00:04:33] Speaker 05:
Your Honor,

[00:04:56] Speaker 05:
This was a local crime.

[00:04:58] Speaker 05:
The government asserts, we deny, the government asserts that this was a local act of prostitution through the internet.

[00:05:07] Speaker 05:
It was a local act of having relations with a minor.

[00:05:10] Speaker 05:
These are both crimes traditionally prosecuted by the state.

[00:05:26] Speaker 05:
it is a slippery slope.

[00:05:28] Speaker 05:
That the internet equals federal jurisdiction, your honor, that that means of interstate commerce would enwrapped almost every local crime and make it a federal crime.

[00:05:40] Speaker 05:
And here's the reason why.

[00:05:41] Speaker 01:
Counsel, I mean, I'm fine with you using your time however you want, but in my view, your argument is foreclosed by walls, and you have to take it up to a higher body if you're going to pursue this more respectfully, Judge.

[00:07:54] Speaker 02:
he can still be guilty on it's it's an or situation there's several ways to prove that correct there are several ways to prove it

[00:08:30] Speaker 01:
that's enough.

[00:08:31] Speaker 01:
Anyone?

[00:08:32] Speaker 01:
Anyone?

[00:08:33] Speaker 01:
Well, you know, Judge.

[00:08:36] Speaker 00:
So in other words, the evidence that you wanted to offer seems to me to negate coercion, but not necessarily entice or persuade.

[00:08:45] Speaker 05:
No, I think they're quasi-synonymous, Your Honor.

[00:09:16] Speaker 00:
persuading, inducing.

[00:09:19] Speaker 05:
Whatever verb we want to use, Judge, that evidence would have negated

[00:10:07] Speaker 05:
Her will must be transformed.

[00:10:09] Speaker 05:
Looking at the evidence that's in the sealed volume, Your Honor, we have the nature of this website.

[00:10:16] Speaker 05:
She went on this website seeking this type of relationship.

[00:10:20] Speaker 02:
Her profile.

[00:10:21] Speaker 02:
But she testified, right, at the trial?

[00:10:24] Speaker 02:
Yes, she did.

[00:10:25] Speaker 02:
And she said that your client didn't make her do anything.

[00:10:29] Speaker 02:
She showed up willingly.

[00:10:31] Speaker 02:
She wanted money.

[00:10:32] Speaker 02:
She asked for the phone.

[00:10:34] Speaker 05:
She... There was no transformation of her

[00:10:45] Speaker 01:
November 18th, starting on page 20.

[00:10:48] Speaker 05:
No, it's in the jury instruction that there has to be a transformation of will.

[00:10:54] Speaker 05:
You know, I don't remember that was argued.

[00:10:57] Speaker 05:
That was argued at the hearing, the pretrial hearing, that there had to be a transformation of will.

[00:11:03] Speaker 05:
Are you familiar with the Dengra case?

[00:11:05] Speaker 05:
Yes, yes, that's the case.

[00:11:16] Speaker 00:
so long as the defendant's actions constitute persuading, inducing, enticing, or coercing 2422-B applies.

[00:11:25] Speaker 00:
So what I'm suggesting, sir, is that I think you have a strong argument

[00:12:05] Speaker 00:
willingness to engage in sexual activity is irrelevant.

[00:12:34] Speaker 05:
have this intersection where A2 intersects with B1C, that he had a constitutional right to present a defense.

[00:12:43] Speaker 05:
And where it intersects with A2 sexual predisposition, the trial court must yield to the defendant and allow him to present a defense and to cross-examine the witness.

[00:12:57] Speaker 00:
I'm not sure you're hearing us.

[00:12:59] Speaker 00:
My premise

[00:13:16] Speaker 00:
that he was charged with here.

[00:13:19] Speaker 00:
And it seems to me there was ample evidence that satisfied these other elements.

[00:13:22] Speaker 00:
And I'm not sure you're getting to that point.

[00:13:25] Speaker 05:
All right.

[00:13:26] Speaker 05:
I don't believe it was harmless.

[00:13:27] Speaker 05:
I don't think removing a defense and making an element of a crime superfluous is harmless.

[00:13:33] Speaker 05:
The jury was given that charge.

[00:13:36] Speaker 05:
The jury was given all of those verbs.

[00:13:38] Speaker 05:
They could have picked any one of them.

[00:13:40] Speaker 05:
That's right.

[00:13:40] Speaker 05:
He had the right to negate whatever.

[00:13:43] Speaker 05:
You're not going to save any time?

[00:13:45] Speaker 05:
Yeah, I'm going to save time, yes.

[00:13:51] Speaker 00:
premise that all of these verbs are synonymous?

[00:13:57] Speaker 05:
They're very close, Judge.

[00:13:58] Speaker 02:
All right.

[00:13:59] Speaker 02:
They're very close.

[00:14:00] Speaker 02:
Okay.

[00:14:00] Speaker 02:
I'll give you two minutes for rebuttal.

[00:14:02] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:14:02] Speaker 02:
Thanks.

[00:14:13] Speaker ?:
Good morning.

[00:14:14] Speaker 04:
Good morning, Your Honors, and may it please the Court,

[00:14:28] Speaker 02:
I think I probably would have let in that evidence at the website.

[00:14:35] Speaker 02:
I don't know why you fought so hard about the whole thing, but the standard is abuse of discretion.

[00:14:40] Speaker 02:
So part of me says, well, OK, another judge does it differently, but it seems like much to do about nothing.

[00:14:48] Speaker 02:
I don't know why the prosecution was fighting so hard to keep out that website, because I don't think it would have made a dramatic difference.

[00:14:55] Speaker 02:
And that's the harmless error argument.

[00:14:58] Speaker 02:
I would agree with your honor that it wouldn't make a difference.

[00:15:02] Speaker 02:
Why did she think it was so damaging?

[00:15:04] Speaker 02:
Because she got on the stand and she admitted everything.

[00:15:08] Speaker 02:
This guy didn't make me do anything.

[00:15:10] Speaker 02:
The jury had the whole picture of this 15 year old girl.

[00:15:32] Speaker 02:
So what's so damaging about this website?

[00:15:44] Speaker 04:
So just a step back for a minute.

[00:16:00] Speaker 04:
happiness that she had found a sugar daddy proud of herself

[00:17:29] Speaker 04:
So I think, and I want to make sure I pivot to harmlessness because I understand, and I do understand the court's concern.

[00:17:35] Speaker 04:
Again, we think the evidence was pretty clear.

[00:18:01] Speaker 00:
It is directly contrary, it goes to negate coercion.

[00:18:05] Speaker 04:
Well, so if I could just step back for a minute.

[00:18:07] Speaker 04:
I think it's completely irrelevant on the thing.

[00:18:09] Speaker 04:
He's saying this evidence is relevant to all the verbs in both counts.

[00:18:13] Speaker 04:
The evidence is completely irrelevant to the 1591 count.

[00:18:17] Speaker 04:
All we had to prove was that, with respect that she was a minor, there was no need to prove any of the other verbs because this wasn't a forced court coercion case.

[00:18:30] Speaker 04:
to present an offense, the Supreme Court has made clear, does not allow a defendant necessarily to present evidence that's either irrelevant or only marginally relevant.

[00:18:40] Speaker 04:
And so that was where the district court had to make this discretionary call.

[00:18:44] Speaker 04:
But I do want to make sure I make clear on the harmless error point.

[00:18:47] Speaker 04:
The evidence was being offered in support of a proposition that was fully consistent

[00:19:02] Speaker 04:
the victim where she testified very directly, I did not feel like I was coerced.

[00:19:08] Speaker 04:
I felt he told me and I felt I could stop at any minute.

[00:19:12] Speaker 04:
I didn't have to go through with the sex.

[00:19:13] Speaker 04:
I didn't have to take the drugs.

[00:19:15] Speaker 04:
She called him a father figure.

[00:19:16] Speaker 04:
One of the only people that she felt really cared about him and was providing for him.

[00:19:21] Speaker 04:
So there was no evidence that she was coerced.

[00:19:26] Speaker 04:
My only pause, your honor, is because in the context of minors who are being sexually victimized,

[00:19:32] Speaker 04:
There it is.

[00:20:15] Speaker 04:
I don't believe that the grand jury minutes are in the record.

[00:20:18] Speaker 04:
I've not seen them.

[00:20:21] Speaker 04:
But what I would say is the claim that's being raised here is an evidentiary claim.

[00:20:25] Speaker 04:
There's no claim that there was an instructional error or that there was insufficient evidence to support a conviction on any of these firms.

[00:20:33] Speaker 04:
Those claims were not made in district court and they're not made in this court.

[00:20:37] Speaker 04:
This is a pure evidentiary error.

[00:20:45] Speaker 04:
proffered would it even if it's relevant to coercion it would have been relevant to proving a point that our own evidence had essentially already conclusively established which is to say she did this because she in her mind wanted to and did not feel coerced

[00:21:15] Speaker 00:
Why did you work so hard to keep this, or I don't mean you personally, but I think what she's asked you to record live is such an effort to keep this out because the jury was going to know exactly what was going on here.

[00:21:26] Speaker 00:
And I have to say, I read the record the same way.

[00:21:29] Speaker 04:
The evidence that was being put forward, including these Instagram chats, and to be clear, Mr. Taylor, although we highlighted some in that appendix that he thinks are most relevant, that's what he says in the district court, he was planning to put all of that

[00:21:46] Speaker 04:
The heart is meant to protect victims of sexual violence or child sex victims of the embarrassment and shame that would come along with having their histories fronted publicly for the jury and just generally publicly.

[00:22:04] Speaker 04:
So there is a clear sort of policy behind that rule.

[00:22:12] Speaker 04:
the reason to keep it up, the rule provides for that evidence to be excluded unless it is necessary for the defendant to present, to be able to-

[00:22:35] Speaker 04:
I mean, that would be, I think, a reasonable course to take here.

[00:22:40] Speaker 04:
Again, I think the evidence is pretty clearly harmless, both because it was cumulative of a point, again, that was already fully established by the victim herself, and because the weight of the evidence was overwhelming, as the court noted.

[00:22:57] Speaker 04:
The weight of this was overwhelming.

[00:23:04] Speaker 04:
this sex for money relationship.

[00:23:07] Speaker 04:
And so those would be the sort of twin ways to think about the harmless error analysis.

[00:23:11] Speaker 02:
I did these kind of cases as a prosecutor.

[00:23:13] Speaker 02:
I heard a lot of them.

[00:23:14] Speaker 02:
And I don't think any jury would have thought for one moment that Mr. Taylor was in any better position because she decided she wanted to be a sugar baby to a sugar daddy.

[00:23:27] Speaker 02:
I mean, jurors aren't going to like the fact that you got a man in his 40s

[00:23:36] Speaker 02:
And they're not going to like it.

[00:23:40] Speaker 02:
So I'm having, it does seem odd that there was such a fight over it because this victim wasn't, she wasn't really that concerned about how she was going to be portrayed or whatever.

[00:23:57] Speaker 04:
I don't, with respect to her, I don't know that the record necessarily shows that she wasn't concerned.

[00:24:02] Speaker 04:
I mean, she testified at trial, and so that's obviously true, but again, the rule is that she didn't.

[00:24:08] Speaker 02:
She didn't backtrack, and she didn't.

[00:24:10] Speaker 02:
She just basically said, I did what I did, and these were the reasons I did it, and Mr. Taylor's not a bad guy, and, you know, it's...

[00:24:19] Speaker 02:
But it doesn't excuse him for the crime.

[00:24:22] Speaker 04:
For sure.

[00:24:22] Speaker 04:
It doesn't excuse him for the crime.

[00:24:25] Speaker 04:
I think the top line harmlessness point here, again, just to reiterate, I think there are actually two.

[00:24:30] Speaker 04:
One is the evidence was offered to prove a fact that we had, as ourselves, already established.

[00:24:35] Speaker 04:
And two, the evidence was overwhelming that he had induced and enticed her.

[00:24:38] Speaker 04:
So another way to think about the harmless error inquiry, whether it's thought of through

[00:24:56] Speaker 04:
And I think that the likelihood is almost zero.

[00:24:59] Speaker 04:
I know it's one left town.

[00:25:01] Speaker 04:
Right.

[00:25:02] Speaker 04:
Because it was going to something.

[00:25:04] Speaker ?:
Can I interrupt you?

[00:25:05] Speaker ?:
Because I think you've answered our question repeatedly.

[00:25:07] Speaker 00:
And there's a little time left on the clock.

[00:25:09] Speaker 00:
And I'm interested to hear about your response to the Miranda argument.

[00:25:12] Speaker 00:
The judge decided that there was not a custodial interrogation here.

[00:25:15] Speaker 00:
I just want to follow up a bit.

[00:25:17] Speaker 00:
This was in time of COVID, arraignment by video.

[00:25:21] Speaker 00:
Is that right?

[00:25:21] Speaker 00:
Yes.

[00:25:22] Speaker 00:
So it's three different locations.

[00:25:23] Speaker 00:
Defense counsel is not co-located with the defendant, as I understand.

[00:25:35] Speaker 04:
Yeah, so I just want to be clear.

[00:25:39] Speaker 04:
I don't think the court made an actual non custodial interrogation ruling.

[00:25:42] Speaker 04:
The issue that was presented for the district court was a 403 issue.

[00:25:46] Speaker 04:
It was not a Miranda issue.

[00:25:48] Speaker 04:
There was, there was a, and that's, that's our top line argument on this point, which is it's waived under rule 12.

[00:25:57] Speaker 04:
where the court says, this is at ER 35, it's not disputed that the defendant was not in custody and the statement was voluntarily made.

[00:26:04] Speaker 04:
Now, Mr. Taylor now says, and he may well be right about this, that he was in custody, but the fact that he did not nail

[00:26:26] Speaker 04:
No one was thinking about Miranda at the time.

[00:27:26] Speaker 02:
that and the other, but then instead he says, Mr. Taylor not being the sharpest knife in the drawer at that point.

[00:27:33] Speaker 02:
Oh, it was only an isolated incident, so it's not so bad that I had sex with a 15-year-old and paid her $400 to show me nude pictures and have sex with me and go three hours.

[00:27:45] Speaker 04:
Right.

[00:27:45] Speaker 04:
Yeah, right.

[00:27:46] Speaker 04:
And our top line argument, judgment to be clear, is

[00:27:52] Speaker 04:
there was no interrogation for purposes of Miranda.

[00:27:54] Speaker 04:
We don't actually fight the custodial points at all.

[00:27:58] Speaker 04:
Yes, that's right.

[00:28:01] Speaker 04:
I'm happy to answer any additional questions if the court has them.

[00:28:04] Speaker 04:
Otherwise, we would ask the court to affirm.

[00:28:06] Speaker 04:
All right.

[00:28:06] Speaker 04:
Thank you.

[00:28:07] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:28:14] Speaker 05:
Judge, there does not have to be an interrogation.

[00:28:18] Speaker 05:
Anything that would evoke an incriminating statement

[00:28:40] Speaker 05:
context of that transcript prior to that question.

[00:29:14] Speaker 02:
what you did and this that and other and I want to see how bad this is.

[00:29:18] Speaker 02:
The judge was just deciding do you stay in custody or do you get out?

[00:29:22] Speaker 05:
Agreed.

[00:29:23] Speaker 02:
However.

[00:29:24] Speaker 02:
I agree with your honor.

[00:29:25] Speaker 02:
However.

[00:29:26] Speaker 02:
I mean it's a nightmare for a defense counsel to have a client do this and you would have bleeped on him had you been there in person or put your hand over his mouth.

[00:29:37] Speaker 05:
And here's the substance of my argument.

[00:29:40] Speaker 05:
The judge created a colloquy that she was asking substance

[00:30:07] Speaker ?:
The magistrate judge was done.

[00:30:09] Speaker 01:
And at that point, after the magistrate judge announced, it's a she.

[00:30:13] Speaker 01:
And it announced her ruling.

[00:30:15] Speaker 01:
Your client said, Your Honor, if I could just speak for a moment.

[00:30:18] Speaker 01:
So even in your view, there were prior interrogations.

[00:30:24] Speaker 01:
This was just, I announced my ruling.

[00:30:26] Speaker 01:
Well, Judge, can I just speak?

[00:30:28] Speaker 01:
So I don't see how, I'm going to hold you on bond and detain you.

[00:30:32] Speaker 01:
It could possibly be an interrogation.

[00:30:34] Speaker 05:
Judge, I see my time is up.

[00:30:35] Speaker 05:
May I respond?

[00:30:37] Speaker 05:
Judge, as lawyers, we can say that, that we can go through that analysis in our minds, that here's where the questioning stopped, and here's where his voluntariness began.

[00:30:50] Speaker 05:
That is not how a defendant sees it, and it must be from his perspective.

[00:30:56] Speaker 05:
He must be knowingly and voluntarily

[00:31:05] Speaker 05:
asked the question, Judge, may I speak?

[00:31:08] Speaker 05:
And the judge permits him to speak, and tacitly, his attorney permits him to speak.

[00:31:15] Speaker 05:
He believed he was speaking without consequences, with impunity.

[00:31:21] Speaker 05:
Oh, I don't think that's true.

[00:31:23] Speaker 02:
I mean...

[00:31:37] Speaker 05:
Is your friend?

[00:31:40] Speaker 05:
No, well, if he asks the judge...

[00:32:07] Speaker 02:
here to speak.

[00:32:09] Speaker 02:
Both of them.

[00:32:10] Speaker 02:
Both the judge and the attorney have a different relationship than the judge does.

[00:32:14] Speaker 02:
The judge is in the courtroom.