Comments on Meanwhile in Bellevue

I don't think so. Isn't it also a federal crime to leave the country with the intention of having sex with a minor?

Hm... maybe you're right, TSM.

@1 You are correct, sir. This was intended so that sex tourists going to Thailand to have sex with 11 year olds of both genders could be prosecuted here. At the same time, proving intent any time you're not actually hiring a prostitute can be difficult.

Either way, given that I'm mentoring a 15 year old fag, this story makes me want to hit people.

...the boy told police he was walking in the Crossroads neighborhood when a man in a car approached him, offering him first money, then alcohol, then marijuana if he could have sex with him.

Is prostitution also not a crime in Canada?

@4, I think you mean "solicitation." Had the boy offered sex in return for money, that would be "prostitution." In this case, the crime is in offering money for sex, i.e. "solicitation." I don't know if solicitation is illegal in Candada, but according to the site that Dan linked us to, "exploitation" of a minor under 18 is considered a crime. So, on top of being prosecuted here for going to Canada for pervy sex, he'd also be prosecuted there for exploiting a minor, solicitation, and possibly contributing to the delinquency of a minor (the booze and drugs). Either way, he's screwed, if not in the ways he imagined...

It's too hard for him to sustain his high on the three hour drive.

I mean, you have be pretty high to follow this guy's MO don't you?

Actually, having sex with a fourteen-year-old is legal if, and only if, there is no power relationship between the two people, and no money or other consideration involved. I think there's also something in there against drugging fourteen-year-olds to have sex with them. Anyways, with regard to this particular situation, here is an excerpt of section 212 (4) of the Criminal Code of Canada:

Offence — prostitution of person under eighteen
(4) Every person who, in any place, obtains for consideration, or communicates with anyone for the purpose of obtaining for consideration, the sexual services of a person who is under the age of eighteen years is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years and to a minimum punishment of imprisonment for a term of six months.

The Conservative Gornment is raising the age of consent to 16 in Canada.

Except in Quebec.

Prostitution is not illegal in Canada. Solicitation is.

Also, funny story about the "legal in Canada part"...

159. (1) Every person who engages in an act of anal intercourse is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years or is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction.
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to any act engaged in, in private, between
(a) husband and wife, or
(b) any two persons, each of whom is eighteen years of age or more,
both of whom consent to the act.

It actually doesn't mean anything because it was struck down as unconstituional but it is still on the books.

Hmmm, as a Canadian (but not a law expert) the high school legal lore was as follows: age of consent was 12, but at that point there could be a maximum of two year age difference. So a 12 year old could have sex with a 14 year old, but not a 15 year old. At age 16 you could have sex with anybody older than you, and as low as 14. Therefore we joked that 16 was the optimal age because you could have legal sex with the widest range of people. (14+)

If this is indeed a myth, it might have been perpetrated by Canada's greatest guilty pleasure export, Degrassi Junior High. In one memorable episode, a very trashy 14 year old lied and said she was 16 to get the attention of guy in his 20s/30s. Said guy was perfectly okay with thoughts of banging a 16 year old, but bolted like lightning when she admitted her lie.

Whether they admit it or not, Degrassi was gospel to any Canadian who hit puberty between '85 and '93.

@11 I so fucking love Degrassi. Marco was the jailbait of my dreams.

Lt. Col. Eric Kruger, died in an IED attack in Baghdad last November.

Read "Say Yes To War" Dan Savage, The Stranger, October 2002

This is ineteresting:

Police posed as the teen... lured the suspect to a local shopping center.

The 32-year-old man has been booked... for... child luring...

Will in Seattle: the Criminal Code is federal in Canada, not provincial.

Fucking Bellevue.