the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ 

No. 22-2621 

G.G. and DEANNA ROSE, 

Plaintiffs-Appellants, 

v.

SALESFORCE.COM, INC., 

Defendant-Appellee. 

____________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. 

No. 1:20-cv-02335 — Andrea R. Wood, Judge. 

____________________ 

On Petition for Rehearing En Banc or Panel Rehearing 

____________________ 

DECIDED October 18, 2023 

____________________ 

Before SYKES, Chief Judge, EASTERBROOK, ROVNER,

BRENNAN, SCUDDER, ST. EVE, KIRSCH, JACKSON-AKIWUMI, LEE, 

and PRYOR, Circuit Judges. 

PER CURIAM. On consideration of defendant-appellee’s petition for rehearing en banc or panel rehearing, filed on August 17, 2023, all judges on the panel have voted to deny panel 
2 No. 22-2621 

rehearing. A judge in regular active service called for a vote 

on the petition for rehearing en banc, and a majority in active 

service voted to deny the petition for rehearing en banc. 

Judges Brennan, Scudder, St. Eve, and Kirsch voted to grant 

the petition for rehearing en banc.

Accordingly, the petition for rehearing en banc or panel 

rehearing by defendant-appellee is DENIED. 
No. 22-2621 3

SCUDDER, Circuit Judge, joined by ST. EVE, Circuit Judge, dissenting from the denial of the petition for rehearing en banc. 

While I agree with the panel’s narrow holding that G.G. 

stated a claim against Salesforce for participation liability under 18 U.S.C. § 1595, I am troubled by the overbroad and unnecessary language in the panel opinion, which risks being 

read to offer answers to questions not presented in this case.

Article III’s Case or Controversy requirement limits federal courts to the resolution of concrete disputes between adverse parties. See Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 

559–61 (1992). When our decisions exceed that limitation— 

when we reason with overbreadth—we risk the issuance of 

advisory opinions. See Muskrat v. United States, 219 U.S. 346, 

362 (1911); see also TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 141 S. Ct. 

2190, 2203 (2021). The majority opinion leaves me with that 

worry.

The opinion clearly explains Backpage’s notorious sex 

trafficking operations, the widespread awareness of those operations, and the scope of Salesforce’s assistance—which, on 

the facts alleged in G.G.’s complaint, could only be understood as furthering those affairs. See Slip Op. at 3–6. The panel 

majority is also right to conclude that § 1595 does not require 

victim-specific knowledge.

Had the opinion stopped there, nobody would be reading 

this dissent. But in too many places the opinion goes further 

and suggests without qualification that § 1595 participant liability could attach to anyone in a “continuous business relationship” with a sex trafficking operation like Backpage. See 

Slip Op. at 17–18, 25, 28, 36–37. It also suggests that 

knowledge can be inferred from the bare allegation that a de 
4 No. 22-2621 

fendant “repeatedly consulted” with a trafficker about its 

business without a link to the illegal activity. See Slip Op. at 

17.

Better to leave tomorrow’s difficult questions about the 

scope of § 1595 for tomorrow’s cases. To put the point more 

directly, everyone reading the majority opinion ought to distinguish between the court’s holding and key reasoning and 

the broader unwarranted commentary suggesting that § 1595 

participant liability may apply in expansive ways to more ordinary business relationships. In my respectful view, our full 

court missed an opportunity to come together to preserve the 

panel’s essential and sound reasoning and to leave everything 

else for another day.