Steffes v. Pollard

WILLIAMS, Circuit Judge.

This is a tragic case all around, for the defendant and his victims. When Matthew Steffes was just fourteen years old, he ran into Joshua Howard, the former boyfriend of a cousin. Howard was twenty-one. Steffes left an abusive, dysfunctional family when Howard invited Steffes to live with him, but the price was steep as Howard prostituted Steffes to have sex with an older man. Howard was in a sexual relationship with a twelve-year-old girl, A.W. She and her thirteen-year-old friend, M.F., ran away from home and stayed with Howard and Steffes at Howard’s apartment and…