Sex Crimes

August 19, 2022

FBI Announces Major Sex Trafficking Sting

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

The FBI announced an operation to break up a major human trafficking ring. The bust resulted in the liberation of 84 minors, 37 of whom were actively missing children. The average age of the minors was 15 years old, but there were some as young as 11. 141 adults were also among those liberated by police. Authorities have identified 85 suspects accused of involvement in human sex trafficking.

The operation included more than 200 local police departments across the country, FBI specialists including intelligence analysts and forensic interviewers. The partnership included National Center for Missing or Exploited Children (NCMEC). 391 operations were conducted over the course of a two-week period.

More than half of human trafficking victims are minors. More than half of all human trafficking victims were approached on social media sites, dating sites, and online.

August 17, 2022

Serial Scooter Groper Charged with Sexual Assault

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

Two victims and a coworker have positively identified a man that they say groped them without their consent while riding by on a motorized scooter. The man now faces multiple accounts of aggravated battery, aggravated criminal sexual abuse, and criminal sexual assault. An image of the man had been circulated since August 6. The man was linked to four separate groping incidents, three of which occurred on August 4. The man allegedly groped the buttocks or genitals of women on the street before fleeing the scene. In at least one case, a victim said that there was sexual penetration. The case broke when an image of the man was distributed to the public. A former coworker was the one to identify the suspect.

The suspect has since admitted to groping the women because they were all “wearing something hot.”

Why Did He Think This Was Okay Behavior?

August 5, 2022

School Teacher Gets 50 Years for Sexual Exploitation of a Minor

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

Allegations against this teacher were reported as early as 2019 when he still worked in the Chicago public schools. The teacher was accused of inappropriately touching the buttocks of a female student who then reported the incident to her mother and the two went to the principal. The behavior occurred on more than one occasion. The girl’s brother reported similar conduct as did two of his classmates.

Prosecutors did pursue misdemeanor charges against the teacher who was later found not guilty in a bench trial. The teacher continued to teach Spanish to third graders when he was arrested for the sexual exploitation of a 12-year-old in Indiana.

According to the allegations, he arranged to meet a 12-year-old boy who he spoke to online and met the boy at a hotel where he molested the boy and recorded the encounter. After the incident, police recovered the teacher’s phone where they found another incident of inappropriate sexual contact with a minor. The other victim was an Illinois resident who was 15 at the time of the assault.

July 22, 2022

Man Indicted on Child Pornography Charges Used Kik Messenger App

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

An Illinois man who was a registered sex offender was indicted on new child pornography charges after exchanging photos with an undercover agent on the Kik Messenger App. Kik has gained notoriety for being a den of child pornography enthusiasts exchanging photos. The app provides the user with total anonymity from other users, but the terms of service stipulate that individuals cannot exchange illegal material using the site’s infrastructure.

The app itself is not nefarious. It was created by college students at the University of Waterloo as a free, anonymous messaging app. The app allows you to create group chats, upload videos, pictures, and files. The group chat feature is where most of the child pornography issues can be found. The only thing you need to use the app is an email address. You then have a username and a handle which is used by other members to find you.

While uploading child pornography to the site violates its terms of service, Kik does not moderate these group chats, so it is left to law enforcement to ensure crimes are not being committed.

July 20, 2022

Can Parents Consent to Sexual Contact on Behalf of Their Children?

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

An Illinois man is alleging that the parents of a child he is charged with sexually assaulting gave him consent to initiate the sexual contact. The man has been charged with the sexual abuse of a 15-year-old girl. He believes that he has committed no crime because her parents consented to the sexual contact. The Chicago man has been extradited to Iowa where he will face the charges. The defense filed a motion to dismiss on the basis of this consent, but consent is not a defense to the sexual abuse of a child. What is a defense is not knowing that the child was under 17 at the time of the assault.

Understanding the Law

I cannot agree on your behalf to allow you to be murdered, even if I am your parent. Children are not property and are not considered as such under the law. While parents have decision-making power over their children, they cannot consent on their behalf to allow the child to become the victim of a crime. The argument is thus meritless in legal terms and would rely entirely on jury nullification of the law under the statute. Lawyers are generally prevented from making such arguments before a jury. Nonetheless, the juries can and do nullify the law in specific cases. Most notably, during prohibition, prosecutors found it difficult to convict individuals accused of bootlegging. There is no jury on earth that would nullify a sex crime against a child. It would be tantamount to arguing that parents are allowed to pimp their children out to pedophiles for money.

July 15, 2022

Governor Closes Loophole in Sexual Assault Law

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

Governor Pritzker recently signed a revision to an Illinois law that made it difficult for prosecutors to pursue charges against perpetrators of sex crimes against a victim who was voluntarily intoxicated. The bill will close a loophole under the law that made prosecutions more difficult when a victim was intoxicated by their own volition. The law as it was written required the perpetrator to cause the intoxication of the victim. The bill added new language to the statute that makes it easier for prosecutors to file charges against a perpetrator when the victim was drunk or high at the time. Nonetheless, the new law only makes room for victims who are unable to give consent at the time of the sexual contact. If the victim was “unconscious of the nature of the act” and the perpetrator “knew that they could not consent” then the sexual conduct is now actionable.

What Happened?

The legislature took the matter up after a young victim was told by police that her experience did not qualify as rape or sexual assault under Illinois law. According to the victim, she was at a friend’s house partying when she was sexually assaulted by another individual. The police told her they would not investigate the charges because she had voluntarily become drunk when she was raped. When she asked the police what legal options she had at her disposal, they told her to not let it happen again and to move on. Instead, she lobbied politicians to close the loophole in the law and now police will be forced to investigate these matters.

July 13, 2022

Substitute Teacher Charged with Enticement/Grooming of Student

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

An Illinois man recently pleaded guilty to grooming charges after he sent a sexually explicit message to one of his former students—a sophomore—over a social media platform. The teacher pleaded guilty to one count of grooming in a negotiated plea deal that saw prosecutors drop another charge of indecent solicitation of a minor and another charge of sending sexually explicit material to a minor. The teacher was accused of sending sexually explicit messages and videos to a 15-year-old girl. The teacher worked at the school for about six weeks.

As a part of the negotiated plea deal, the teacher will be required to serve at least 90 days in the county jail. He will additionally be on 24 months of probation, and he will have to register as a sex offender for at least 10 years. He will also need to undergo a sex offender evaluation.

What is a Sex Offender Evaluation?

April 29, 2022

CPS Security Guard Accused of Sexual Misconduct

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

A Chicago public schools security guard is facing charges that he had an inappropriate sexual relationship with a 15-year-old student. The guard was suspended pending an investigation and now more allegations have surfaced. The security guard is now facing two counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse of a minor. The students, who are 15 and 16, say that the security guard touched them inappropriately. Both students were male. The second victim informed his mother of the incident, which is when authorities became involved. They traced their way back to a second victim.

What is Aggravated Criminal Sexual Abuse?

Aggravated criminal sexual abuse, as opposed to criminal sexual abuse, is sexual abuse plus any one of a number of aggravating circumstances. Aggravating circumstances include the use of a weapon during a sexual assault, the use of drugs to induce a sexual assault, a victim over 60 years of age, or a minor victim when the attacker is an adult. In most cases, aggravated sexual assault is considered a second-degree felony in Illinois. However, when an adult perpetrator and minor victim is involved, it escalates to a class-one felony.

April 6, 2022

Father Convicted in Bizarre Exploitation of College Women

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

Larry Ray is going to prison, perhaps for life, after a New York jury convicted him on 15 counts all related to the exploitation and extortion of his daughter’s friends. Ray managed to convince his daughter to allow him to move into the dorms shortly after he was released from prison on a securities fraud conviction.

Ray managed to convince one victim that she had poisoned him and owed him reparations. The woman paid between $10,000 and $50,000 per week to make amends, at one point even performing sex work to make payments. Another woman revealed that her life was turned upside down when she met Ray. She was on track to become a medical doctor when she became romantically involved with him. He would often ask her to have sex with other men while he videotaped it.

The entire scheme appears to have hinged on Ray using a Svengali-like ability to manipulate those around him. Ray was able to convince several students that they had poisoned him after he agreed to let them stay at his apartment. To make amends, they did as Ray asked, including giving him a lot of money, performing yard work, and more.

December 10, 2021

The People v. Ghislaine Maxwell

by Law Offices of David L. Freidberg, P.C.

What happens when the main suspect of a prosecution kills himself before he can go to trial? The state will find the next culpable person and nail them to the wall. In terms of Jeffrey Epstein, that person is Ghislaine Maxwell. Epstein was accused of running a criminal scheme targeting underage girls for sexual abuse. Epstein would pay the girls for sex, have them tell their friends that he was paying for sex, and the girls would perform sexual favors for Epstein. Maxwell is believed to have helped Epstein organize and hide his activities. The defense claims that they are targeting Maxwell because they no longer have Epstein to convict. While their claim is likely true, it does not mean necessarily that she was not involved in a criminal conspiracy to target underage girls for sexual abuse.

Maxwell is accused of soliciting minors for Epstein during the early ’90s. By the 2000s, Epstein had already employed his pyramid scheme approach which avoided Maxwell’s involvement in recruiting girls to abuse.

Analyzing the Defense Strategy