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Client found not guilty of charges of Internet Luring x 2, and Obtaining the Sexual Services of a Person Under 18 after two day trial in the Ontario Court of Justice. The client was charged in a York Regional Police project called “Raphael” designed to catch individuals who are attempting to obtain services of minors. The client had messaged a lady who advertised on the Backpages website and unbeknownst to the client the person at the other end was an undercover police officer. The main issue was given the context of the communications, the timing and sequencing of messages, did the client take reasonable steps to ascertain the person purported to be the escort was older than 18. The defence lawyer Joseph Neuberger established through cross-examination at trial that P.L. had in fact inquired about age and because of the overlap in messaging, P.L. had the reasonable belief that the alleged escort was actually 25, when in fact the undercover officer was referring to an amount of money in his messages but without the use of a dollar sign. Joseph Neuberger carefully scrutinized the messages and obtained a forensic analysis of the client’s phone to establish timing of the messages. A comprehensive book of authorities was filed at trial by the defence and it was clear to the judge that P.L.’s belief that the person he thought he was communicating with was 25 and not underage, and thus he had taken “reasonable steps” to ascertain the age and was satisfied that she was 25 years of age. This was a very technical defence based on the evidence and case law, BUT P.L. was sincere and honest in his belief and was found not guilty at trial.