Opinion ID: 2633305
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: CCO 12.08.030 lacks a specific intent element

Text: CCO 12.08.030 also lacks a specific intent element. Although other jurisdictions have prostitution loitering ordinances that clearly require specific intent, Clark County's ordinance does not. Rather than criminalizing loitering with a specific intent to commit an act of prostitution, CCO 12.08.030 criminalizes loitering in a manner and under circumstances manifesting the purpose to engage in prostitution. In Rowland, the Supreme Court of Ohio failed to find a specific intent element in a drug loitering ordinance that used language identical to that in CCO 12.08.030 and further determined that such an element was irreconcilable with the ordinance's goal: [S]pecific intent ... cannot be found in the language of the ordinance. More significant, a specific intent requirement is irreconcilable with the goal of the ordinance, which is to permit arrest and conviction when an individual is acting under circumstances manifesting the purpose to commit a drug crime. [But a]cting under circumstances manifesting a purpose to do something is a far cry from specifically intending to do something. For example, a carpenter carrying a tool belt and ladder down a dark street late at night may well be manifesting the purpose to burglarize a home. This evidence, however, certainly does not show that he or she specifically intends to commit burglary. [34] Similarly, under CCO 12.08.030, high school cheerleaders flagging down cars for a car-wash fundraiser or celebratory tourists reveling with passersby during a public holiday may also be manifesting the purpose of inducing, enticing, soliciting for or procuring another to commit an act of prostitution. However, that evidence does not show that they are specifically intending to engage in prostitution. In contrast to CCO 12.08.030, most of the prostitution loitering ordinances that have been upheld clearly require a specific intent element. Those ordinances criminalized loitering with the intent to commit prostitution; [35] for the purpose of engaging in soliciting or procuring sexual activity for hire; [36] when a person intentionally solicits, induces, entices, or procures another to commit prostitution; [37] or variations thereof. One prostitution loitering ordinance that contained the circuitous under circumstances manifesting the purpose of intent language of CCO 12.08.030 was upheld because it subsequently and specifically stated that the violator's conduct `must ... demonstrate a specific intent to induce, entice, solicit or procure another to commit an act of prostitution.' [38] CCO 12.08.030 contains no such circumscribing language. Accordingly, we conclude that CCO 12.08.030 lacks a specific intent element. Because CCO 12.08.030 chills constitutionally protected conduct and lacks a specific intent element, the prostitution loitering ordinance is unconstitutionally overbroad.