United States v. Whorley

Dwight Whorley (defendant) was using a computer in a public resource room that the Virginia Employment Commission (the commission) maintained for jobseekers. A woman informed an employee that Whorley was viewing child pornography. Whorley was standing in front of the printer and, upon request, showed commission employees Japanese anime-style cartoons of children engaged in explicit sexual conduct with adults. Whorley was banned from using the commission’s computers and escorted out of the building. The employees found additional obscene cartoons next to the computer Whorley had been using and printed several emails from Whorley’s email account, which was still open on the computer. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) obtained additional evidence about Whorley’s email account from his account provider and discovered that Whorley had conducted numerous searches for obscene materials and had obtained the materials he sought. Whorley was convicted of violating 18 US.C. § 1462 by knowingly receiving on a computer obscene Japanese anime cartoons depicting minors engaging in sexually explicit conduct. Section 1462 prohibited the importation, transportation, and receipt of obscene matters. On appeal, Whorley argued that § 1462 was unconstitutional because its use of the word “receives” was impermissibly vague in the context of receiving obscene matter from an interactive computer service. Whorley maintained that someone who innocently received an obscene text message or found that an obscene image had appeared as a pop-up ad would violate the statute, and therefore the statute failed to give notice as to when criminal liability attached.