Opinion ID: 2735164
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: “With Intent to View”

Text: Brune contends the statute is unconstitutionally overbroad since it does not require that the offender specifically intend to view an image of child pornography. As we highlighted above, our review of the statutory text starts with a fair and commonsense assessment of the statute’s reach. United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460, 485 (2010) (reviewing animal cruelty statute). “[A] court should not invalidate a statute on its face simply because [it] may criminalize some protected speech.” Ward v. Utah, 398 F.3d 1239, 1247 (10th Cir. 2005). Rather, we must guard that we do not “go beyond the statute’s facial requirements and speculate about ‘hypothetical’ or ‘imaginary’ cases.” Wash. State Grange, 552 U.S. at 450–51. But still we must also indulge “a judicial prediction or assumption that the statute’s very existence may cause others not before the court to refrain from constitutionally protected speech or expression.” Broadrick, 413 U.S. at 612. It is Brune’s burden to show, “‘from the text of [the law] and from actual fact,’ that substantial overbreadth exists.” Hicks, 539 U.S. at 122 (alterations in the original) (quoting N.Y. State Club Ass’n., Inc. v. City of New York, 487 U.S. 1, 14 (1988)); see also Members of City Council v. Taxpayers for Vincent, 466 U.S. 789, 801 (1984) (“[T]here must be a realistic danger that the statute itself will -17- significantly compromise recognized First Amendment protections of parties not before the Court for it to be facially challenged on overbreadth grounds.”). For a challenger to carry this burden, he must identify protected materials that would be inevitably targeted by the statute. See Faustin v. City & County of Denver, 423 F.3d 1192, 1201 (10th Cir. 2005) (“[I]n this case Faustin has presented no evidence and made no showing that Denver’s policy has ever been applied to prohibit any expression on [highway] overpasses other than [clearly proscribable speech] or that Denver’s policy has ever been so broadly interpreted by the public in a way that it has chilled any such speech.”); see also United States v. Sayer, 748 F.3d 425, 435–36 (1st Cir. 2014); United States v. Dean, 635 F.3d 1200, 1206 (11th Cir. 2011). Indeed, overbreadth exists where a challenger can point to “actual fact[s]” that would permit unconstitutional applications of the statute. N.Y. State Club Ass’n., 487 U.S. at 14 (rejecting an overbreadth challenge where the appellant failed to create a record of existent clubs to which the statute would be unconstitutionally applied in violation of the First Amendment). This requires a “statute’s application to real-world conduct, not fanciful hypotheticals.” Stevens, 559 U.S. at 485 (Alito, J., dissenting). The Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Stevens is instructive. In that case, the defendant attacking the statute demonstrated that “depictions of ordinary and lawful activities . . . constitute the vast majority of materials subject -18- to the statute.” Stevens, 559 U.S. at 473 (emphasis added). 7 By contrast, Brune has not described examples of constitutionally valuable speech that might be punishable under the statute as he interprets it. He provides no specific examples, and his hypotheticals fall short of establishing that a considerable amount of speech subject to the statute is deserving of protection. For example, Brune argues the statute might theoretically reach a 500-page book containing a great deal of protected speech and a single image of child pornography. Reply Br. at 8. But in the end, “the mere fact that one can conceive of some impermissible applications of a statute is not sufficient to render it susceptible to an overbreadth challenge.” Taxpayers for Vincent, 466 U.S. at 800. To deny Brune’s overbreadth challenge, therefore, we need not decide, as he suggests, if an individual with no specific intent to view the image of child pornography itself can be punished under the statute. 8 Read either way, the statute is not overbroad. It is enough that, on the record before us, we see no evidence that the impermissible applications of § 2252A(a)(5)(B), to the extent 7 In Stevens, the challengers of the statute submitted extensive documentation of actual movies, magazines, and books that would be subject to the statute despite their social, artistic, and literary value. See generally Br. for Respondent, United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460 (2010) (No. 08-769), 2009 WL 2191081. 8 We note that in many ways Brune’s reading of the statute is grammatically superior to the government’s. Still, Brune’s argument fails because, even accepting his reading, the statute is not unconstitutionally overbroad because its legitimate sweep far exceeds its impermissible applications. -19- any exist, are substantial in comparison to the unprotected, criminal speech that the statute unquestionably covers. This is not to say that Brune’s construction of the statute is frivolous or unjustifiable; but it is to say that his offered interpretations do little to expose the overbreadth of the statute in either an absolute or relative sense. See, e.g., Board of Trustees of State Univ. of N.Y. v. Fox, 492 U.S. 469, 485 (1989). And read contextually, we are convinced the statute’s meaning is readily understandable and not overbroad. 9 9 The thrust of the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on child pornography strengthens our conclusion. As previously emphasized, child pornography is a category of speech unworthy of First Amendment protection. Brown v. Entm’t Merchs. Ass’n, 131 S. Ct. 2729, 2763 (2011) (comparing the categorical prohibition on child pornography to less absolute areas of unprotected speech). Furthermore, the Court has consistently recognized that statutes banning the possession of child pornography are not chiefly aimed at shielding citizens from the content of the speech itself. See Osborne, 495 U.S. at 109–10. Instead, the harms underlying the creation of child pornography (including child sexual abuse), the economic motives for its production, and the market-making effects engendered by its existence all raise compelling concerns that justify congressional prohibitions on the production and possession of child pornography. See Paroline v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 1710, 1717 (2014); see also Osborne, 495 U.S. at 109–11; Ferber, 458 U.S. at 757–60. With these considerations in mind, § 2252A(a)(5)(B) is sufficiently tailored to support valid congressional interests without overreaching to circumscribe substantial amounts of protected speech. Nor does Ashcroft not change the result. In that case, the Supreme Court struck down portions of a federal child pornography statute, finding that a ban on virtual child pornography was unconstitutionally overbroad because those depictions cultivate only contingent and indirect harm to minors. Ashcroft, 535 U.S. at 250. Not so here. Section 2252A(a)(5)(B)’s target is materials containing actual depictions of child pornography, which indisputably breed the collection of harms that Congress reasonably seeks to eradicate. -20- In sum, we see no grounds for administering the “strong medicine” of overbreadth invalidation to § 2252A(a)(5)(B) because Brune cannot show substantial overbreadth in either an absolute or relative sense.