Opinion ID: 1315511
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Areas or Locations Where Children Are Likely to Congregate

Text: MacMillen first complains that the special condition prohibiting him from frequenting locations where children are likely to congregate is both overly broad and unconstitutionally vague. The condition is overbroad, he claims, because it involves a greater deprivation of liberty than is necessary and precludes him from frequenting places where children are not likely to congregate. He claims that the condition is impermissibly vague because it does not provide him with sufficient notice of what is and is not permitted. In Peterson, the sentencing court imposed the following special condition of release upon a defendant who had a prior state incest conviction: [The] defendant is prohibited from being on any school grounds, child care center, playground, park, recreational facility or any area in which children are likely to congregate. 248 F.3d at 82. We held that, while a district court would not abuse its discretion in imposing a condition of release that restricts [a] defendant's ability to visit places where children are likely to congregate, the condition as written in that case was ambiguous and, depending on its meaning, excessively broad. Id. at 86. This was because it was unclear whether the clause `in which children are likely to congregate' applie[d] only to `any area,' or to the other places listed. Id. That is, we found that it was unclear whether the prohibition applie[d] only to parks and recreational facilities in which children congregate, or whether it would bar the defendant from visiting Yellowstone National Park or joining an adult gym. Id. While a district court is justified in prohibiting sex offenders from being in areas where children are likely to congregate, we concluded, there would be no justification to forbid the defendant from being at parks and educational or recreational facilities where children do not congregate. Id. Accordingly, we remanded for clarification of this condition. Id. ; accord United States v. Kieffer, 257 Fed.Appx. 378 (2d Cir.2007); United States v. Raftopoulos, 254 Fed.Appx. 829 (2d Cir.2007). MacMillen contends that the special condition imposed here is overbroad for the same reasons as the challenged condition in Peterson. We disagree. Notably, the district court did not impose the condition recommended in the PSR, which mirrored the problematic condition at issue in Peterson. Rather, the district court carefully reworked the PSR's proposed condition so that it applies only to places where children are likely to congregate. The list following this operative phrase, which includes schools, playgrounds, and the like, is merely illustrative of the types of places where children are likely to be. Nothing in the court's enumeration of these types of places indicates that MacMillen is forbidden from entering areas where children are unlikely to be. Indeed, in Dupes, we rejected a challenge to a special condition of supervised release that used language similar to the one MacMillen challenges here. The district court in that case ordered the defendant to stay more than one hundred feet from places primarily used by children such as schoolyards, playgrounds and arcades. 513 F.3d at 342. We found that this condition did not suffer from the same infirmities as the condition in Peterson. Id. at 344 n. 3. Accordingly, we conclude that the condition imposed upon MacMillen, which is much closer to the condition at issue in Dupes than to the one at issue in Peterson, is not impermissibly overbroad. MacMillen's claim that this condition is unconstitutionally vague is likewise without merit. Due process requires that conditions of supervised release be sufficiently clear to inform [the defendant] of what conduct will result in his being returned to prison. United States v. Simmons, 343 F.3d 72, 81 (2d Cir.2003) (internal quotation marks omitted). A condition of supervised release is unconstitutional if it is so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning and differ as to its application. Id. But conditions of supervised release need not be cast in letters six feet high, or . . . describe every possible permutation, or . . . spell out every last, self-evident detail. United States v. Johnson, 446 F.3d 272, 280 (2d Cir.2006) (internal quotation marks omitted; alterations in original). They may provide the defendant sufficient notice of what conduct is prohibited even if they are not precise to the point of pedantry. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). The condition challenged here provides MacMillen with adequate notice of what conduct is prohibited  namely, frequenting places where children are likely to congregate. In Peterson, we expressly stated that such conditions are permissible. 248 F.3d at 86. Moreover, in Johnson, we rejected a vagueness challenge to a condition of a supervised release, much like the one at issue here, prohibiting the defendant from being in any area in which persons under the age of 18 are likely to congregate, such as school grounds, child care centers, or playgrounds. 446 F.3d at 280-81. Finally, MacMillen's concern that he inadvertently may be in a place where children are likely to congregate is unavailing because conditions of supervised release are read to exclude inadvertent violations. Id. Accordingly, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in ordering MacMillen not to frequent locations where children are likely to congregate, and then appending to that formulation a non-exclusive list of exemplars.