Bill To Increase Penalties For Teen Sextortion Passes Arizona House
By Staff Reporter |
The Arizona House passed a bill increasing prison time for adults who target teenagers with sexual extortion, or “sextortion.”
HB 2666 passed out of the House with unanimous bipartisan support on Monday. The bill increases the penalty for adults who commit sextortion against minors ages 15 through 17 by increasing the offense level from a class 3 to class 2 felony. It also requires sentencing to be consecutive to any other sentence imposed for sextortion.
The bill would prohibit offenders from eligibility for sentencing suspension, probation, pardon, or release from confinement unless the court-imposed sentence has been served or commuted.
Arizona statute already has sextortion of minors under the age of 15 listed as a class 2 felony.
The bill did receive an amendment to address certain concerns by stakeholders.
Vicky Lopez, an attorney with Arizona Attorneys for Criminal Justice (AACJ), spoke against the bill during its committee hearing. Lopez expressed concerns that the bill as written would provide offenders with an affirmative defense that they didn’t know their victim’s age, and that the bill failed to address the circumstance of both the offender and victim being minors.
The Arizona Anti-Trafficking Network and Maricopa County Attorney’s Office (MCAO) expressed support for the bill as written. The MCAO said it was against amending the bill.
Rebecca Baker on behalf of the MCAO rejected AACJ’s stance that this bill would provide an affirmative defense, and that minor offenders shouldn’t be held equally accountable.
“We’re talking about coerced conduct. We’re talking about one person forcing another person to have sex, and that’s analogous to sexual assault. I see that very differently than something like sexual conduct with a minor or even exchanging photos openly that are somehow later misused. This is forced conduct,” said Baker. “Regardless of whether the perpetrator is 15, 16, 17, or even 35, it’s still having that same effect on the victim.”
However, legislators who spoke up on the bill during the committee hearing seemed inclined to agree with AACJ. One committee member, Rep. Khyl Powell (R-LD14), agreed that minor offenders needed to have special considerations.
“I want discretion to be given back to judges. If we’re going to protect our juveniles who do something stupid, then we need to open up the door and give back to the judges’ discretion,” said Powell. “If we continue to mandate and we lock in these laws, then we will create additional victims.”
The bill author, Rep. Pamela Carter (R-LD4), said in a press release on Monday that sextortion of minors was an especially heinous type of exploitation that merits a harsher punishment.
“Sexual extortion is hitting Arizona teens hard, and the predators behind it know exactly what they’re doing,” said Carter. “If you prey on teens for money or sexual favors, you should face a class 2 felony and mandatory consecutive prison time. No probation. No shortcuts. No easy way out.”
Sextortion crimes occur often through social media platforms, namely Snapchat, Instagram, and Discord.
One recent case that occurred in Arizona concerned a ringleader of an online violent terror network, 764. The Tucson man arrested for those crimes, Baron Martin, was arrested in December 2024 for committing sextortion against minors. This past October, Martin was indicted on 29 charges.
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