What is the name of your state? Michigan
I noticed a posting was set to close. I can probably understand why when a question seems to only produce negative responses, none of which are helpful. I will admit though, I skipped page 2. And for Omicron, I believe your acquired friend can easily use the entrapment defense. But tell your friend that he should realize he was stupid to trust a friend/dealer/person of the night to have gone through all that trouble. And I wouldn't have personally gone so far as to buy drugs and end of delivering them too. I would've have been the first to say.. ugh... you don't suspect anything weird? I'm sure the guy who needed your acquired friends assistance, and since your friend was the least likely to put a hit on him, he won! yay. It's nice when being nice pays off.
The critical factor in the defense of entrapment is that the person would not have committed the crime but for the actions of the government, in other words that the person was *otherwise unwilling*. That is to say, if the actions of the government were the critical factor which converted an otherwise uninterested person into a criminal, then it will be entrapment. But if the government merely provides the opportunity for a person to act on their own criminal intentions, then it is not entrapment.
A good example is the use of bait cars by some urban police departments, which will park an ordinary looking car by the side of the street and keep it under surveillance. When a person hot-wires the car and tries to drive off, they cut the ignition by remote control and move in. Courts have ruled this procedure is not entrapment. Since the bait car was parked in an ordinary way, such that it did not stand out from other cars, it is clear that any person who tried to steal it was already intent on stealing a car, and that notion was not planted in their minds by anything the police department had done.
On the other hand, if the police department had left the car with the windows open, the doors unlocked, and the keys hanging out of the driver's-side door with a sign that said "be back tomorrow", a situation would be created whereby the notion of stealing the car might be implanted into the mind of a person who otherwise might never have stolen a car. Such a case would be entrapment.
In the case of child molestation, the same reasoning applies, and police must be very careful how they develop the online relationship with the potential molestor: If they go on the internet and say, "Hi im a 17 yr old girl looking for sex! I sure am horny! I really want some sex! call me at this # right away!!!", the very idea of having sex with the girl might be implanted into the mind of a person who otherwise might never have thought of having sex with an underage person. That would be entrapment.
On the other hand, if the police are careful to allow the online relationship to develop so the molestor is the one who brings up the idea of having sex, un-prompted by anything that the child has said online, then it will be clear that the molestor was already intent on committing the crime, and the police could clearly not be accused of putting the idea there. In other words, in such a case the person was not "otherwise unwilling."
There has been a conviction overturned on grounds of entrapment, where child pornography was actively and repeatedly marketed to a person by a government agency. But if a person is already looking for sex online, then it is clearly not entrapment.
Reference:
Jacobson vs. United States, 503 U.S. 540 (1992)
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/90-1124.ZD.html
I noticed a posting was set to close. I can probably understand why when a question seems to only produce negative responses, none of which are helpful. I will admit though, I skipped page 2. And for Omicron, I believe your acquired friend can easily use the entrapment defense. But tell your friend that he should realize he was stupid to trust a friend/dealer/person of the night to have gone through all that trouble. And I wouldn't have personally gone so far as to buy drugs and end of delivering them too. I would've have been the first to say.. ugh... you don't suspect anything weird? I'm sure the guy who needed your acquired friends assistance, and since your friend was the least likely to put a hit on him, he won! yay. It's nice when being nice pays off.
The critical factor in the defense of entrapment is that the person would not have committed the crime but for the actions of the government, in other words that the person was *otherwise unwilling*. That is to say, if the actions of the government were the critical factor which converted an otherwise uninterested person into a criminal, then it will be entrapment. But if the government merely provides the opportunity for a person to act on their own criminal intentions, then it is not entrapment.
A good example is the use of bait cars by some urban police departments, which will park an ordinary looking car by the side of the street and keep it under surveillance. When a person hot-wires the car and tries to drive off, they cut the ignition by remote control and move in. Courts have ruled this procedure is not entrapment. Since the bait car was parked in an ordinary way, such that it did not stand out from other cars, it is clear that any person who tried to steal it was already intent on stealing a car, and that notion was not planted in their minds by anything the police department had done.
On the other hand, if the police department had left the car with the windows open, the doors unlocked, and the keys hanging out of the driver's-side door with a sign that said "be back tomorrow", a situation would be created whereby the notion of stealing the car might be implanted into the mind of a person who otherwise might never have stolen a car. Such a case would be entrapment.
In the case of child molestation, the same reasoning applies, and police must be very careful how they develop the online relationship with the potential molestor: If they go on the internet and say, "Hi im a 17 yr old girl looking for sex! I sure am horny! I really want some sex! call me at this # right away!!!", the very idea of having sex with the girl might be implanted into the mind of a person who otherwise might never have thought of having sex with an underage person. That would be entrapment.
On the other hand, if the police are careful to allow the online relationship to develop so the molestor is the one who brings up the idea of having sex, un-prompted by anything that the child has said online, then it will be clear that the molestor was already intent on committing the crime, and the police could clearly not be accused of putting the idea there. In other words, in such a case the person was not "otherwise unwilling."
There has been a conviction overturned on grounds of entrapment, where child pornography was actively and repeatedly marketed to a person by a government agency. But if a person is already looking for sex online, then it is clearly not entrapment.
Reference:
Jacobson vs. United States, 503 U.S. 540 (1992)
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/90-1124.ZD.html