Opinion ID: 597486
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: What Level of Scienter Does the Constitution Require?

Text: 26 Gottesman contends--and the government does not dispute--that a statute prohibiting the distribution of printed or taped materials that does not require some knowledge of the contents of the material violates the First and Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. The Supreme Court so ruled in Smith v. California, 361 U.S. 147, 80 S.Ct. 215, 4 L.Ed.2d 205 (1959). In Smith, the Court held that the First Amendment prohibits prosecution of a book distributor for possession of an obscene book unless the distributor has knowledge of the contents of the book. 361 U.S. at 153, 80 S.Ct. at 218. See Ferber, 458 U.S. at 765, 102 S.Ct. at 3358 (As with obscenity laws, criminal responsibility may not be imposed without some element of scienter on the part of the defendant.); see also Osborne v. Ohio, 495 U.S. 103, 115, 110 S.Ct. 1691, 1699, 109 L.Ed.2d 98 (1990) (noting the requirement laid down in Ferber that prohibitions on child pornography include some element of scienter). 27 The Smith opinion did not delineate the level of scienter that the Constitution requires. In Hamling v. United States, 418 U.S. 87, 94 S.Ct. 2887, 41 L.Ed.2d 590 (1974) and Ripplinger v. Collins, 868 F.2d 1043 (9th Cir.1989), however, the constitutional requirements were clarified somewhat. In Hamling, a defendant convicted of distributing obscene material argued that the government was required to prove that he knew that the material was obscene. The Supreme Court, in rejecting this argument, stated that: It is constitutionally sufficient that the prosecution show that a defendant had knowledge of the contents of the materials he distributed, and that he knew the character and nature of the materials. Hamling, 418 U.S. at 123, 94 S.Ct. at 2910. We applied Hamling in Ripplinger, finding a statutory definition unconstitutional on its face because it did not require actual knowledge of the contents of the pornographic material. In so ruling, we indicated that a statute must require knowledge of the character of the materials in order to pass constitutional muster. Ripplinger, 868 F.2d at 1056. 28 In purporting to apply these principles here, the government once again skates a very fine line in its brief. It concedes that, to be constitutional, the statute must require knowledge of the nature and character of the material, and it sometimes formulates this requirement as knowledge that the material is child pornography. On the other hand, it appears to resist a requirement of proof that the defendant know that one or more performers were underage. It emphasizes that the Constitution does not require knowledge by the defendant of the actual age of the underage performer. Of course that must be true. The question, however, is whether it requires knowledge that one or more performers was under age 18. In at least part of its argument, the government seems to suggest that there is no such requirement: 29 Thus, the scienter required by the child pornography statutes is analogous to that required for obscenity convictions--general knowledge of the nature of the contents of the materials, not knowledge of the specific age of the minor. See also United States v. Thomas, 893 F.2d 1066, 1070 (9th Cir.1990) (section 2252(a) does not require proof that defendant knew that pornography involved a minor).... 30 Government's brief, p. 17. At oral argument, the government moved away somewhat from this perch and conceded that the statute would have severe constitutional problems if it did not include a requirement of knowledge that at least one performer engaged in the specified sexually explicit acts was under 18 years of age. 31 Whatever the government's position, we conclude that the constitutional minimum requirement of scienter for the Act's proscription of transporting or receiving child pornography is knowledge that at least one of the performers is under age 18. It is true that, in Hamling, it was not necessary that the violator know that the material he was distributing was obscene. But the Supreme Court's point was that it was not essential that the violator know the legal status of the materials; he could not avoid prosecution by simply claiming that he had not brushed up on the law. Hamling, 418 U.S. at 123, 94 S.Ct. at 2911. The question before us does not concern the defendant's requisite knowledge of the law; it concerns his knowledge of a particular fact--the underage of the performer. 32 Our decision in United States v. United States District Court for the Central District of California, 858 F.2d 534 (9th Cir.1988), is highly instructive. There we dealt with charges under section 2251(a) of the Act against producers of films also featuring the redoubtable Traci Lords; the issue was whether the producers were entitled to an affirmative defense that they were deceived by Lords into believing that she was an adult. We held that the First Amendment required that provision for such a defense be engrafted onto the Act. Id. at 538-44. We declined to hold, however, that the Constitution required knowledge of the minority of the performer to be an element of the offense. Our reasons for so declining are most relevant here: 33 Defendants would have us go farther and hold that the first amendment requires the government to prove scienter as part of its case. They rely on the Supreme Court cases holding that the government must carry such a burden in cases involving booksellers and other downstream distributors. See, e.g., Hamling, 418 U.S. at 123, 94 S.Ct. at 2910. We do not view these cases as controlling here. Those who arrange for minors to appear in sexually explicit materials are in a far different position from those who merely handle the visual images after they are fixed on paper, celluloid or magnetic tape. While it would undoubtedly chill the distribution of books and films if sellers were burdened with learning not only the content of all of the materials they carry but also the ages of the actors with whom they have had no direct contact, see Smith, 361 U.S. at 153-54, 80 S.Ct. at 218-19, producers are in a position to know or learn the ages of their employees. We note that several states have taken this approach.... 34 Id. at 543-44 n. 6. These considerations concerning distributors or receivers are directly applicable here, and we find them compelling. Section 2252 potentially applies to all kinds of recipients or distributors of videotapes and magazines. To render them all prima facie criminals if one of the performers in a portrayal of sexually explicit conduct is underage, without the distributor's or recipient's knowledge, would be to create precisely the kind of chilling effect condemned by Smith. That we cannot do consistently with the First Amendment as the Supreme Court has interpreted it. 35 We conclude, therefore, that the First Amendment mandates that a statute prohibiting the distribution, shipping or receipt of child pornography require knowledge of the minority of the performers as an element of the crime it defines. Section 2252, as authoritatively construed by Thomas, does not so require. 36 The question then arises whether, in the face of Thomas, we could construe section 2252 so as to save its constitutionality. In District Court, we engrafted an affirmative defense onto section 2251(a) in order to save it. Despite that example, we do not feel free to follow an analogous course here. First, it comes closer to judicial rewriting of a statute to engraft onto it an element of the crime than it does to recognize an affirmative defense, of a type that often exists without being specified in the statute defining the crime. See District Court, 858 F.2d at 542. Second, Thomas decided the precise question whether knowledge of the performer's underage was an element of 2252, and it cited District Court for the analogous proposition that scienter was not an element of section 2251. Thomas, then, was decided in full knowledge of District Court and its rationale. Thomas nevertheless ruled squarely that scienter of the minority of the performer was not an element of the crime defined by section 2252. Not sitting as an en banc court, we regard ourselves as bound by Thomas's interpretation.