Opinion ID: 1042115
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Entry and Acceptance of Reingold’s Guilty Plea

Text: On March 18, 2009, Reingold was indicted by a grand jury sitting in the Eastern District of New York on four counts of distributing child pornography based on the GigaTribe “sharing” of four specified video files to the undercover agent on November 17, 2008, see 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(2), (b)(1); and one count of possessing child pornography, see id. § 2252(a)(4)(B), (b)(2). On September 16, 2009, Reingold pleaded guilty before a magistrate judge to the first distribution count. Before formally accepting Reingold’s guilty plea and in anticipation of sentencing, the district court conducted hearings between September 2009 and May 2011 where it heard from “a dozen expert witnesses in the fields of child sexual abuse; online child pornography; risk assessment; treatment of sex offenders; and neuropsychology and adolescent brain development.” United States v. C.R., 792 F. Supp. 2d at 349. Together with prosecutors, defense counsel, and two of his law clerks, the district judge also traveled to Massachusetts and personally toured FMC Devens, the Bureau of Prisons facility that offers inmates sex offender treatment. See id. at 520–24. On May 10, 2011, the initial sentencing date, the district court declined to accept Reingold’s guilty plea before the magistrate judge, questioning whether the undercover agent’s retrieval of child pornography from Reingold’s designated shared folder on Reingold had stimulated to the point of ejaculation; (2) a 15-year-old girl with whom Reingold had performed mutual genital stimulation and oral sex; and (3) a 16-year-old girl whose vagina Reingold had touched through her sweat pants. Because the government focuses on Reingold’s sexual activity with his sister rather than these other encounters in making certain arguments on appeal, we do not discuss this additional conduct further. 6 GigaTribe was enough to make the defendant guilty of distribution under 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(2). Although the government and defense counsel both urged acceptance of the plea,5 the district court adjourned the case to May 16, 2011, to allow it to consider the matter further. On May 16, 2011, the district court accepted Reingold’s guilty plea. On the record, it explained that its acceptance was “based on the allocution and all other information now known to me.” May 16, 2011 Sentencing Tr. 5:21–22. In its published opinion filed the same day, however, the district court expressed continued reservations as to whether the defendant had adequately admitted knowing and intentional distribution of child pornography as proscribed by 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(2). See United States v. C.R., 792 F. Supp. 2d at 353–55 (construing statute to require proof of both “active intent[]” to transfer child pornography to another person and “active participation” in delivery of such pornography).6 In the end, however, the district court accepted the guilty plea, explaining that the statute’s distribution element might be construed to reach Reingold’s conduct; that “a jury could reasonably find that [Reingold] was not truthful when he testified that he did not intend to distribute his files to another individual”; that a court can accept a guilty plea even when a defendant maintains his innocence, “as long as there is a strong factual basis for the plea”; 5 Defense counsel submitted that a guilty plea to a distribution count carrying a five-year minimum was in Reingold’s interest because the government was considering superseding the indictment to add an advertising charge carrying a 15-year mandatory minimum sentence. See 18 U.S.C. § 2251(d)(2), (e). 6 In hearings conducted by the district court, Reingold stated that his goal in participating in the GigaTribe website was “to receive child pornography.” United States v. C.R., 792 F. Supp. 2d at 354. Nevertheless, “in achieving that goal he knew that he had to make his child pornography files available to others.” Id. 7 and that the record showed Reingold to have thoroughly considered his decision to plead guilty with the support of close relatives and able counsel, and to have demonstrated a wish to accept responsibility for his conduct. Id. at 356–57 (citing North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 37–38 (1970)).7