Co-defendants, Armani Booker (“Booker”) and Holly Arnold (“Arnold”), who is Booker’s prostitute, recruited the victim after finding her soliciting for prostitution on a street corner. Booker asked the victim what her age was a number of times, and she responded "18" each time, even though she was 14-years old. Booker drove the victim to a hotel where he took nude pictures of her and advertised her prostitution services on the internet. Over the next two days, the victim engaged in at least one commercial sex act as a prostitute.
1st Instance:
Court: United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin
Date of decision: 25 January 2011
Reference: Docket Number: 10-cr-00133
2nd Instance:
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Date of decision: 8 November 2011
Reference: United States v. Booker, 447 Fed. Appx. 726 (7th Cir. Wis. 2011)
Other clarifying information:
Only co-defendant, Booker, appealed.
2nd instance:
The defendant appealed his sentence arguing that it should have been below the guidelines, because (1) he did not subjectively believe the minor victim was under 18 years of age and (2) the minor was already working as a prostitute when the defendant recruited the victim.
Regarding the first challenge, this Court noted the district court’s acknowledgement of a defense expert report stating that a lay-person could not conclude from the victim’s appearance only that she was under 21 years of age. Though, this Court also noted the district court’s finding that the defendant did believe the victim was under 18 years of age because he repeatedly asked her what her age was, indicating that the defendant doubted her claim of being 18.
Regarding the second challenge, this Court noted the district court having explained that, even though the minor victim was a sex worker when the defendant recruited her, he further trained the victim on how to prostitute herself more profitably and posted pictures of the victim on the internet. The district court believed these two acts victimized the minor victim “to a new level” and this Court believed this explanation to be sufficient to support the issued sentence.
This Court affirmed the district court’s sentence.
United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Co-defendant, Arnold, was a prostitute for the main co-defendant, Booker.
This case involves a minor victim who was already a prostitute before being further victimized by the defendant.