NOT GUILTY verdict in Gwinnett County
Jul 16, 2019OUTCOME: NOT GUILTY
Client was caught up in a police sting in Gwinnett. Police placed an ad on an escort site where they advertised certain acts, some of which involved sex acts and some did not. Client called the ad, p ... olice directed him to the hotel, he arrived, gave them some money, and began to make himself a little more comfortable. All on video. He was arrested and charged with Pandering - which is soliciting an act of prostitution. The State would not come off of 12 months to serve 6 months in jail despite my client having ZERO criminal history. We went to trial and argued that the police did all the soliciting for sex. They placed the ad, they rented the hotel, they told him where to go, they asked for the money, they asked for condoms, they did all of the talking. And more than half of the items in their ad were not even sex so how do they know what he was there to do? I got the police officer to admit on the witness stand that my client didn't solicit in the recorded phone calls, he didn't solicit on the video in the room, he didn't solicit in the texts, and that she was the one who put all of the info in the advertisement. I gave the jury the example of someone placing an ad to buy a truck "Buy this truck for $500, it's good for commuting, off-roading, hauling, and moving. It's also great for armed robberies, speeding, DUIs, reckless driving, etc." I show up to buy the truck and they arrest me for armed robbery even though i never said what i was buying the truck for. That's what happened here, 5 out of the 9 things in the ad were not for sex and he never solicited the undercover officer for a sex act." The jury returned a verdict in 15 minutes. They agreed that the State did not prove their case.
