Bloodless Coup

Judge Trott's Dissent in US v. Curtin

Howard Bashman provided this description of the a recent 9th Circuit ruling:

"With the walls of our homes breached by the Internet, our next best defense is the law." So writes Ninth Circuit Judge Stephen S. Trott, at the outset of his lengthy dissent today from a three-judge panel's ruling that a district court erred in admitting into evidence stories extracted from the defendant's PDA about a father's having sex with his young daughter and the daughter's enjoyment of the experience. The defendant-appellant was convicted of traveling across state lines with intent to engage in a sexual act with a minor and using an interstate facility to attempt to persuade a minor to engage in sex. Today's decision, by a 2-1 vote, necessitates a new trial of the case.

As someone who finds the nexus between tech/communication issues and criminal law interesting, I was intrigued and skimmed through the opinions. I'm obviously not an expert on these issues but it looks to me like the majority (J. Clifford Wallace and Pamela Ann Rymer) made the right call here. What kept me reading though is that Judge Trott so clearly despises the substantive implications of that result, and eventually comes around to loathing the precedent it's based on - seemingly because he's just so appalled at what it requires the courts to do. I've no problem with a judge being appalled by the details of a sex crime - but when it leads to a lot of thrashing about and more disgusted belllowing and cries of revulsion than carefully reasoned analysis, well, to me when that happens an appellate judge is falling down on the job.