OMAHA, NEBRASKA – United States Attorney Randolph J. Seiler announced that a Loup City, Nebraska, man convicted of Attempted Trafficking with Respect to Involuntary Servitude and Forced Labor was sentenced on November 10, 2016, by Chief Judge Jeffrey L. Viken, U.S. District Court.
Marcus Lee Dorsey, age 36, was sentenced to 4 years of imprisonment, followed by 2 years of supervised release, and ordered to pay a $100 special assessment to the Federal Crime Victims Fund.
Dorsey was one of four men who were arrested and federally indicted as a result of an undercover sex trafficking operation conducted during the 2015 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, targeting persons willing to pay to have sex with underage girls obtained through the Internet.
The conviction stemmed from Dorsey responding to an online advertisement posted by Division of Criminal Investigation undercover agents, which purported to offer young girls for sex. Following several messages with a person Dorsey believed to be associated with a 15-year old girl, but who was in fact an undercover agent, he proceeded to negotiate the time and place they would meet, along with the price he would pay, which was $70.
The undercover operation and arrests were a joint effort between the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation, the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Rapid City Police Department, and the Pennington County Sheriff’s office. Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah Collins prosecuted the case.
Dorsey was immediately turned over to the custody of the U.S. Marshal’s Service.
I suppose it’s possible, but I’d have two questions: (1) what do you mean by “personal information” and (2) why won’t you answer my questions?
Attorneys owe ethical obligations to past and present clients, specifically that they will not perform work in matters substantially related to cases they’ve already worked on. So if, for example, I represent Company A in a dispute over a workplace accident, I would need to be sure that Individual B who came into my office wasn’t asking me to sue Company A in connection with the workplace accident or something similar, as I wouldn’t want to lose my representation of A. Therefore, I would need to know at least enough “personal information” from a prospective client to make sure that what B wants me to do doesn’t conflict with my work for A or any other clients. I can’t just begin advising a client completely blind and hope for the best.
But assuming you clear conflicts and I can take your case, the amount of additional “personal information” I need to know will vary from case to case. It’s important to remember that attorney-client privilege shields nearly all communications (save potentially when you threaten imminent harm to someone else, or when you seek to use the attorney/client relationship to further an ongoing crime or fraud) between attorney and client from discovery by an opponent; absent these very limited exceptions, your lawyer cannot divulge your secrets, even if he/she wants to. This rule exists because of fairness concerns, but also because, generally speaking, lawyers need to know a great deal of information (some of which is bound to be ugly, embarrassing, even reprehensible) in order to fully represent the interests of the client. So, generally speaking, the more relevant information I know about you and your situation, the better I can represent you. And when there’s bad information, the sooner I learn of it, the sooner I can figure out how to manage it. One thing that no lawyer likes is surprises from a client, because when bad information is disclosed in a surprising manner, we no longer have any control, and are simply trying to stop the bleeding. You’d be getting off on the wrong foot by insisting on keeping secrets from your lawyer.
But that being said, I don’t need to know everything about you in order to represent you. Let’s say that I can take your workplace injury case, and that it involves your being hit by heavy boxes in a warehouse. I need to know everything about th accident, and every piece of relevant information that the other side might use to deny/reduce responsibility. You wouldn’t want to hide the fact that your boss had previously been cited for improper workplace safety in the weeks prior to the accident. But on the flip side, if, for example, you had been drinking at lunch prior to the accident, that’s not something that you should keep secret from me, either. But do I need to know that several years ago, you were unfaithful to your spouse? That you smoked weed a few times in college? That you like to sing show tunes in the shower? No, because that information has nothing to do with the accident in question. In order to represent you well, a lawyer needs to know a lot about you, some of which may be embarrassing/unpleasant. But the lawyer doesn’t need your complete life story.
More info: wesettle.com