United States v. Christopher James

I am puzzled and confused by Part III of the opinion. My colleagues work hard to prove that the district court read 18 U.S.C. § 2242(2)(B) too narrowly, but I’m not sure how the majority’s reading is any *684different from that of the district court— or mine, for that matter. The whole enterprise seems misguided because the statute is clear and thus not reasonably susceptible to conflicting interpretations.

Here’s what the statute says:

Whoever ... knowingly ... engages in a sexual act with another person if that other person is ... physically incapable of declining participation in, or…