UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 17-4414

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

JOHN WILLIAM RANSIER,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore. 

J. Frederick Motz, Senior District Judge. (1:15-cr-00300-JFM-1)

Submitted: March 28, 2018 Decided: April 4, 2018

Before WILKINSON, NIEMEYER, and KING, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Teresa Whalen, LAW OFFICE OF TERESA WHALEN, Silver Spring, Maryland, for 

Appellant. Stephen M. Schenning, Acting United States Attorney, P. Michael 

Cunningham, Lauren E. Perry, Assistant United States Attorneys, OFFICE OF THE 

UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
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PER CURIAM:

Following a jury trial, John William Ransier was convicted of using and 

attempting to use a facility of interstate commerce to persuade, induce, entice, or coerce a 

person who had not attained the age of 18 to engage in sexual activity, in violation of 18 

U.S.C. § 2422(b) (2012). Ransier appeals, asserting that the evidence was insufficient to 

support his conviction. For the reasons that follow, we affirm.

We review de novo the sufficiency of the evidence supporting a conviction. 

United States v. Barefoot, 754 F.3d 226, 233 (4th Cir. 2014). A defendant challenging 

evidentiary sufficiency carries “a heavy burden.” United States v. Cornell, 780 F.3d 616, 

630 (4th Cir. 2015) (internal quotation marks omitted). This court will uphold a 

conviction if, “view[ing] the evidence in the light most favorable to the government

. . . [,] any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime 

charged beyond a reasonable doubt.” Barefoot, 754 F.3d at 233 (internal quotation marks 

omitted). “[R]eversal for insufficient evidence is reserved for the rare case where the 

prosecution’s failure is clear.” United States v. Said, 798 F.3d 182, 194 (4th Cir. 2015) 

(internal quotation marks omitted).

Under 18 U.S.C. § 2422(b), “[w]hoever, using the mail or any facility or means of 

interstate or foreign commerce, . . . knowingly persuades, induces, entices, or coerces any 

individual who has not attained the age of 18 years, to engage in . . . any sexual activity 

for which any person can be charged with a criminal offense, or attempts to do so, shall 

be fined under this title and imprisoned not less than 10 years or for life.” Id. Section 

“2422(b) comprises four elements: (1) use of a facility of interstate commerce; (2) to 
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knowingly persuade, induce, entice, or coerce; (3) a person who is younger than eighteen; 

(4) to engage in an illegal sexual activity.” United States v. Fugit, 703 F.3d 248, 254 (4th 

Cir. 2012) (internal quotation marks omitted). Ransier contends that the evidence was 

insufficient to establish the second element: to wit, that he persuaded, induced, enticed, 

or coerced.*

 

We agree with Ransier that the evidence does not support a finding of coercion 

and therefore consider only whether the Government established that Ransier persuaded, 

induced, or enticed. Because the terms “persuade,” “induce,” and “entice” are not 

statutorily defined, we accord them their ordinary meaning. United States v. Clarke, 842 

F.3d 288, 296 (4th Cir. 2016). In ordinary usage, the terms “persuade,” “induce,” and 

entice” “are effectively synonymous, and the idea conveyed is of one person leading or 

moving another by persuasion or influence, as to some action or state of mind.” United 

States v. Engle, 676 F.3d 405, 411 n.3 (4th Cir. 2012) (internal quotation marks and 

brackets omitted). 

 * Ransier implies that, because the jury instructions listed these actions in the 

conjunctive, the Government was required to prove that he persuaded, induced, enticed, 

and coerced. However, § 2422(b) employs disjunctive language. Consequently, the 

jury’s verdict may be upheld as long as the evidence was sufficient to establish that 

Ransier persuaded, induced, enticed, or coerced. See Musacchio v. United States, 136 

S. Ct. 709, 715 (2016) (“when a jury instruction sets forth all the elements of the charged 

crime but incorrectly adds one more element, a sufficiency challenge should be assessed 

against the elements of the charged crime, not against the erroneously heightened 

command in the jury instruction”); see also United States v. Iverson, 818 F.3d 1015, 1027

(10th Cir.) (citing Musacchio in rejecting sufficiency of the evidence argument based on 

jury instructions that set forth the means of committing the offense in the conjunctive, 

where statute was worded in disjunctive), cert. denied, 137 S. Ct. 217 (2016). 
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We conclude the evidence in this case was sufficient to establish that Ransier 

attempted to use a facility and means of interstate commerce to persuade, induce, or 

entice a person he believed to be a 13-year-old girl to engage in sexual activity. Ransier 

answered a Craigslist ad under the Casual Encounters listing posted by an undercover 

Baltimore County detective using the name “Christy S.” This ad did not indicate that the 

advertiser was a minor. However, two weeks later, the detective posing as Christy S.

responded to Ransier’s email and identified “herself” as a 13-year-old girl. Ransier 

readily acknowledged his belief that he was speaking to a 13-year-old girl and requested 

her photo. When Christy S. told Ransier that she did not have a phone, he told her he 

could get her one if she was “good,” and promised to “spoil” her. He initiated the next 

email exchange by asking “Christy S” for a “sexy pic,” began a sexually explicit dialog 

with her, said that he wanted someone to spoil and who, in exchange would take care of 

him, and he requested that they meet in person. When “Christy S” asked Ransier how 

she could know that he would not “cut [her] up and put [her] in a hole,” he reassured her 

by saying that he would spoil her so much that all of her friends would be jealous and she 

would fall in love with him. In all these ways, Ransier sought to persuade, induce, and 

entice a 13-year-old girl to engage in sexual activity. 

We conclude that the evidence was sufficient to support Ransier’s conviction and 

therefore we affirm the criminal judgment. We dispense with oral argument because the 

facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and 

argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED