## Facts

- A Los Angeles police detective found Alessandro Moncini’s name and address during a search connected to an American pornography collector and initiated contact by mail.
- The detective sent Moncini a letter with a nude photograph and proposed trading child pornography; Moncini responded and requested more pictures.
- After additional exchanges, the detective asked Moncini to send child pornography to “prove” involvement; Moncini mailed pages torn from a pornography magazine, and later mailed additional pictures and a videotape to California.
- Moncini conceded on appeal that the pictures and videotape constituted child pornography covered by 18 U.S.C. § 2252.
- Moncini, an Italian citizen and resident, was arrested when he entered New York and was prosecuted in the Central District of California.
- At a bench trial, Moncini’s primary defense was ignorance of U.S. law, supported by evidence that noncommercial private mailing of such material was not criminal under Italian law; he also argued entrapment.
- He was convicted under 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a) for mailing child pornography.

## Issues

1. Whether the federal district court in California lacked jurisdiction because Moncini mailed the materials from Italy.
2. Whether 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a) required proof that Moncini knew his conduct violated U.S. law, or whether due process required an ignorance-of-law defense where the conduct was lawful in Italy.
3. Whether the government entrapped Moncini by initiating contact, supplying images, and encouraging him to mail prohibited material.

## Decision

- The Ninth Circuit affirmed the conviction.
- The court held the district court had territorial jurisdiction because the charged mailings were a continuing offense that occurred in part as the materials traveled into and were received in California.
- The court held § 2252(a) did not require the government to prove Moncini knew his conduct was illegal under U.S. law, and foreign legality did not create an affirmative defense or a due process notice requirement.
- The court upheld the trial court’s rejection of entrapment, concluding the government’s conduct provided an opportunity rather than improper inducement and the evidence supported a finding of predisposition.

## Legal Principles

- A crime involving mailing prohibited material into the United States may be treated as a continuing offense occurring within U.S. territory as the mailing transits and arrives at its U.S. destination, supporting jurisdiction in the destination district.
- When a statute requires that a defendant act “knowingly,” the requirement generally concerns knowledge of the nature of the material and the act, not knowledge that the conduct violates U.S. law, absent explicit statutory language.
- Ignorance of U.S. law is not a defense to a federal criminal charge, even if the conduct is lawful where initiated abroad, and due process does not generally require the government to prove a foreign defendant’s awareness of U.S. criminal law when the defendant intentionally directs conduct into the United States.
- Entrapment fails where the government merely provides an opportunity to commit the offense and the factfinder reasonably concludes the defendant was predisposed to commit it.

## Conclusion

The Ninth Circuit sustained Moncini’s conviction for mailing child pornography into California, holding that the offense occurred within the United States for jurisdictional purposes, that the statute did not require knowledge of U.S. illegality and due process did not supply an ignorance-of-law defense, and that the trial court reasonably found no entrapment.


United States v. Moncini, 882 F.2d 401 (9th Cir. 1989)