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Seventh Circuit affirms 210-month prison sentence for child porn dowloader/purveyor

By Douglas A. Berman

Ayone who follows closely the discussion and debate over federal child pornography sentencing terms will want to be sure to check out today's work by the Seventh Circuit in US v. Mantanes, No. 10-1590 (7th Cir. Jan. 13, 2011) (available here), which affirms a within-guideline 210-month sentence for a defendant found with a collection of "1,380 images and 141 videos of children engaged in sexually explicit conduct."  There are various interesting aspects of Mantanes, including this discussion of the Second Circuit's work in the Dorvee case: Mantanes also argues that his sentence was substantively unreasonable.  He urges us to follow the reasoning of the Second Circuit in Dorvee.  But Dorvee is easily distinguishable. In remanding for resentencing in Dorvee, the Second Circuit expressed concern that the sentencing judge assumed that the defendant was likely to assault a child (although he was convicted of a noncontact offense), and that this assumption motivated the sentencing judge to place ?unreasonable weight? on the need to protect the public...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on January 13, 2011 (boomark / email).